AssGrabbing
by sparra-music
Summary: NO SLASH. Everything's FUBAR as usual when Steve makes a suggestion that sets Danny off.  "NO!  Just, no.  Nuh-um.  Hell, no,"  he swore.  Muttering quietly, he added, "I can not believe he just went there.  Even for Steve, that's just too far."
1. SUSFU

Disclaimer: They're not mine. _I wish!_ Then I could live in Hawaii...

Warnings: Here there be violence. And bad language. Hence the T rating.

PS. NO SLASH HERE. I mean it. NONE. Even though there are basically only two characters here, and even though I named it _Ass-Grabbing_, there is absolutely, positively NO SLASH here. Just so that we're clear on that up front.

PSS. I LOVE reviews. Please click the button at the bottom and tell me what you think of the way I spent most of the last three hours...

_**Ass-Grabbing**_

_**SUSFU**_

_**Situation Unchanged: Still Fucked Up**_

Danny was just beginning to come around when he suddenly felt something touch his butt. He jumped slightly in his chair, jerking his arms painfully. _What the hell? Oh, yeah._

"Danny?" He barely recognized his partner's gravelly voice.

"Yes, Steve?" Danny's voice was strained and quiet.

"You back with me?"

"No, Steve." Danny couldn't resist snarking, despite the terrible thumping in his head. "My arms are handcuffed through the back of someone else's chair." He paused, thinking painfully. "And I think I wish I was still unconscious."

"I'm glad you're not." Steve whispered. "You were out a long time."

"Yeah, well... concussion."

"Can you see?"

"Blurry." Danny didn't mention the multiple images; every time he closed his eyes for a few seconds and opened them again, there were fewer boxes in front of him. He figured he'd get back to single vision soon enough, at this rate.

"We still need to get out of here."

"I seem to remember having this conversation with you once before. The _**first **_time we woke up in this warehouse after getting our asses grabbed by the very gang we were trying to rescue hostages from."

"Yeah, but... SUSFU."

"Soos-foo?" Danny rolled his eyes, even if his partner couldn't see it. "Why must you insist on using military terms when there are perfectly good, normal acronyms like FUBAR to express yourself with?"

"FUBAR _**is**_ military. And you should learn SUSFU: Situation Unchanged: Still Fucked Up."

Danny groaned. "You're right. SUSFU is my whole life since you."

Steve sighed heavily, wincing. This was an argument they played out weekly. Or more. Danny accused him of being a trouble magnet; Steve pointed out that police work wasn't without risks; Danny used the statistics sent back with the last batch of requisitions from supply to point out, _**again**_, that they used twice as much ammo as SWAT and went through tac vests at six times the rate the average HPD officer did and were therefore getting shot at at least six times as much, and _**therefore**_ his lifespan was being _**considerably **_shortened by knowing Steve; Steve would tell him, once again, that he knew he'd never _**really **_want to give up being part of 5-0 because even though he might _**hate **_the danger, Danny _**really did like**_ putting the bad guys away. Danny would get the last word, of course, reiterating that he was dangerous, but Steve knew he'd still have his back. Even if FUBAR and SNAFU did seem to describe their situation more often than Steve liked.

_Wait a minute!_ Steve realized he'd had the entire argument in his head; Danny hadn't said a thing_. And Quiet Danny is B-A-D_. "You still with me, Danny?"

"Huh?" Danny blinked. "You ask a question?"

"Did you just conk out on me again?"

"Don't think so." Danny started to shake his head in an attempt to clear away the cobwebs, but stopped immediately as the pain spiked, the room spun, and the bile rose in his throat. Swallowing it down, he groaned.

"You hurt other than the concussion?"

Steve's worried tone stopped Danny from replying acidly, but he couldn't completely hold back the sarcasm. In fact, it was practically dripping from his lips as he replied, "Bruised as all hell from that beat-down, but I don't think anything's broken. You?"

"I'm fine."

"_**Of course**_ you are."

"Ready to make a break for it while the going's good?"

Danny sighed. "I'm exhausted and we're both beat up. Couldn't we wait a couple hours, build up our strength, and hope we get rescued in the meantime?"

"No." Steve's steely determination made Danny sigh again. "They might come back and beat on us some more. We can't afford to wait."

"Did it escape you that we are still back-to-back, with our arms cuffed through each others' chairs? If we move, we'll most likely only hurt ourselves more."

"Not if we grab on to each other and move together," Steve said.

"That's still no guarantee."

"It's better than nothing."

Danny fidgeted in his handcuffs. "You know, it doesn't help matters that the only thing I can reach right now is your ass."

Steven managed a hoarse bark of laughter. "Some people might consider that a positive. A lot of people think I have a nice ass."

Danny's eyes widened. "NO! Just, no. Nuh-um. No, no, no, no, no. _**Hell**_, no," he swore. Muttering quietly, he added, "I can _**not believe**_ he just went there. Even for _**Steve**_, that's just too far."

Steve made a gargling sound that might have been a chuckle. Danny wasn't sure; the punch to the throat during the original take-down and the subsequent beating had really thrown off Steve's tones. Even his normal voice had a strangled tinge to it that Danny didn't care for.

"Good, you're pissed."

"WHAT?" Danny practically screamed. "You're happy that I'm pissed? What the hell is wrong with you, McGarrett? Because in case you missed it, we are _**supposed **_to be on the same team here!"

"Danny. _**DANNY**_!" Steve raised his voice to interrupt the rant. "Maybe it's failed to register with you, but I've noticed that you _**always **_get a second wind to rant when someone pisses you off. Which means you now have the energy to try to help us escape."

"Are you serious?" Danny hissed. "You pissed me off _**on purpose**_ to liven me up?"

"What can I say, anger energizes you. I had to tap into it." Steve paused. "Now, before we waste all of our energy arguing, can I suggest we try to move before those idiots come back?"

"For the record, I still think this is an asinine idea. Either or both of us could very easily dislocate our shoulders trying to move like this."

Steve knew Danny was right about that. But still... "Would you rather sit here and do nothing?"

Danny sighed. "You sure the cavalry's not coming?"

It was Steve's turn to sigh. "Not any time soon. You know the list of gang properties we had to look through for the hostages was as long as your arm. And the list I gave Chin and Kono was just as long. Best case scenario, they found the original hostages and freed them. Machigasura did say that we screwed up their original plan.

"But you know as well as I do that if they did find the hostages, that means there was probably a gunfight or something to free them. They'd have to take the hostages to the hospital, collect statements, process the scene, book the gang members there, maybe interrogate some of them... a whole shitload of stuff that would take up their time before they could even get around to missing you and your knowledge of the most expedient way to fill out paperwork. The BAMF twins could even have been injured themselves, they could be stuck in the hospital...

"Or they could have tried to call us," Steve continued, "and found out that we're unreachable, and have come looking for us. In which case, they'll have two dozen places to check, and it'll be three days from now by the time they get through the list. Or, it's entirely possible that this gang has laid traps in more locations than just this one, and Chin and Kono are now tied to chairs and getting beaten, or dead.

"Gee, you're just Mr. Positive today, aren't you?" Danny replied.

"You seriously think I haven't weighed all the possibilities?"

"Yeah, but how about _**not**_ sitting here imagining Chin and Kono going through the same shit we are?"

"Does that idea piss you off?"

"Hell, yeah."

"Good, mission accomplished. Now grab on and let's try to skootch about six inches to your left."

Danny reluctantly followed instructions, but not without growling, "If you ever even so much as _**insinuate **_to another person that I had to grab your a- hold on where I'm holding on to you at this moment- I _**will**_ kill you. Slowly and painfully."

"Come on, Danno, you know you love me."

"_**Not **_ like that."

"Likewise." Steve grunted. "Hold up a second." Danny heard him wheeze slightly as he drew a deep breath in. It was worrisome. He couldn't remember his stamina outpacing Steve's. _**Ever**_.

"Hey, SuperSEAL, you're not back there trying to move with a punctured lung or something, are you?"

" 'M fine." Steve wheezed.

"Sure you are." _Idiot_, he thought. _Can't even admit he's hurt when it's perfectly obvious, even without being able to see him._

" 'Kay. Let's go." Steve grunted.

They both grabbed on to each other again and shifted the chairs six inches closer to the goal in the weirdest three-legged race ever attempted.

Two feet later, the door opened. Danny saw it, immediately dropped the chair back to the floor, and whispered. "Stop! They're back."

He was even more worried when he felt Steve not only quit trying to move his chair, but slump backwards in it, Steve's head lolling against the back of his own.

"Steve? Steve!" He hissed vehemently. _Shit._ He looked back at their captors. _Double shit. We are _**so**_ FUBAR right now._


	2. FUBAR

I should be shot for foolishness. And then used as an example of what not to do.

Hello, I'm Sparra, and even though I have the flu and should really be resting, I stayed up ALL NIGHT to write fanfiction. And it's now time for me to go to work, and I haven't slept at all. And I am still sneezing so loudly they can hear me in Vancouver, still have sinuses so badly clogged that I can't breath through my nose, and my muscles ache so badly I want to ask everyone I see for the license number of the bus that ran me over. And now my head aches as well, and my eyes are very tired from staring at my laptop screen for- how many hours in a row is it now? Fourteen? Oh, sixteen and a half. No, no, that's not too long. I've got at least another half an hour in me before my optic nerves short out.

And now, I am going to post the next chapter of my story, without even so much as editing it myself, let alone having someone else beta it or waiting to hear back from the forums I posted on to try to check my dubious secondhand knowledge of important canonical facts. Why? Because I CAN, that's WHY! And I want to read more reviews from my awesome reviewers! And I want to hear you all scream in frustration when you get to the end of this chapter and realize that yes, I ended it there, because I am an evil genius! Hahahahahaha!

My voice! Is that MY voice!

And no, just because I just took 6 pills of 4 different kinds and am quoting obscure parts of children's movies in my author's note (which I am reading aloud in as dramatic tones as I can muster with my voice half gone), does not mean I am loopy on prescription drugs!

And now, without further ado, I give you (sweeping arm gesture) The REAL Chapter 2!

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_**FUBAR**_

_**Fucked up Beyond All Recognition**_

Ponytail, as Danny had dubbed the giant with the shaved head except for a two-foot ponytail, was approaching him with a leer of pleasure on his face. _Great. Just great. Because apparently this guy likes his job just a little too much. _The veins in the man's biceps and neck rippled beneath his skin as he flexed his muscles menacingly. He was in the process of cracking each knuckle individually when one of the three who questioned them earlier laid a hand on his arm and stopped him.

Purple-Splash, who Danny had named for the distinctively colored dye spot in his black hair, leaned down to glare at him. "How did you get here?"

"Well, assuming this is still the same warehouse cum garage cum booze joint we were in this morning, we drove." Danny smiled brightly as his adversary glared at him. "That was an easy one; can I have more questions like that?"

Signaling with a single finger, Purple-Splash sicced Ponytail on him; three punches to the gut later, Machigasura (who was literally the _**only**_ one of the gang members in the room who'd come up on the gang's who's who list the day before, when Chin had compiled that terrifically-awful, oh-so-helpful list of known gang bigshots and properties they owned) came into Danny's line of sight and commanded the bouncer-wannabe to stop.

"This wimp's still asleep," announced another gang member from behind Danny's back.

"Then wake him!" Purple-Splash snapped. Machigasura nodded over Danny's head at whatever thug was behind him before turning his piercing gaze back to Danny, "And you, Detective, would be wise to stop playing the fool and start cooperating."

Danny was just about to retort when a five gallon pail of water got upended over his head (and Steve's as well, he was assuming). Spluttering, he glared at Machigasura and tried to channel one of his partner's bad-ass glares.

Steve, however, was taking uncooperativeness with their captors to the next level. He remained unconscious- or at least put up a good enough show of it- that another bucket of water was dumped over the two of them. This time, Danny caught a glimpse of the man doing it; the man rivaled Kamekona for size and weight, and had at least six women, in various states of undress, tattooed on his arms. His gray tank top had sweat stains on the chest, and Danny rather hoped that he was still seeing double when it came to the number of blood flecks there, too. _Probably not, though. When Lady-Tats got sick of punching us before, he was the genius who sent Scrawny to get a crowbar._

_Speak of the devil, here he comes again. Scrawny_ (Danny thought the guy's real name might have been Chang or Shang or something like that, but he really wasn't sure) _seemed to be the enforcer with the most control. But the least status. Because why should gang members, half of whom probably do the drugs they run, care about controlling themselves when they're beating someone up?_

Right now, from the sounds of it, he was lightly slapping Steve's face in an attempt to wake him.

Earlier, though, he hadn't held back...

{_flashback_}

"What is this place?" Danny whispered as he slipped through the door behind his partner. "The first room looked like a bar, the second one looked like a motorcycle shop, the third room had every conceivable part they could possibly need in their shop, and this room is just a warehouse full of crates. It's like they couldn't decide what purpose they wanted this building to serve, so they just made it a little bit of everything. Who does that? I mean, it's not like they're short on properties. There were what, forty-two? on that endless 'short-list of known gang properties' Chin compiled..."

"Shut up, Danny," Steve hissed. Even though they'd been inside this building for upwards of fifteen minutes now without encountering a soul, his gut was telling him things were about to go south any time now.

'Any time now' turned out to be approximately ten seconds after they'd moved on to the next room full of crates and boxes. A tattooed fist came flying out from behind one stack of crates, connected with Danny's skull, and sent him crashing into the corner of another wooden crate. He left a smear of blood on the crate, but managed to keep his feet under him and dive back towards his attacker with a roared, "Five-0! Put your hands up!"

Needless to say, his attacker didn't obey. He tried to punch the detective again, but failed to properly take Danny's scrappy nature into account; this was brought to his attention as the wind left his body in a rush when Danny slammed into him full force, using his now-bloody head like a battering ram.

Steve had turned as soon as he heard the noise, only to be knocked down by someone jumping on his back. He hit the floor heavily and dropped his gun when the small man on his back slammed his elbow into the floor. With a roar, he bucked the slight Asian off, and looked for his gun, but it couldn't see it anywhere. Steve got to his feet as quickly as possible, only to be met by a hard punch to the throat. Steve tried desperately to breathe through the pain as he landed a kick on the chest of his attacker, who had apparently expected him to go down from the throat punch.

Meanwhile, a third man came up behind Danny as he finished handcuffing the first attacker and got the cop in a headlock for a few seconds. Danny leaned forward and threw him off, but was momentarily distracted by his black leather jacket. _Because _**really?**_ Who wears a leather jacket in Hawaii in the summer? Is this guy _**trying**_ to get heat stroke?_ The few seconds' lapse in concentration cost Danny as the attacker hurled a crate at his head. He ducked, but came up right into the man's fist. Two left hooks and a body slam later, Danny was slipping to the floor, unconscious.

Steve had just landed a kick to Scrawny's side when Danny's attacker swung at him. He bobbed his head to the side, the fist scraping his ear as it went past. He grabbed the man's shoulders and drew them down as he thrust his knee into the man's gut. The pain of a fist smashing into his back made him whip around again to face his original attacker. He threw a right cross but was blocked. _There's no way I'm going to be able to keep doing this. I've got to get my back to something so that I can face them both at once,_ Steve thought frantically as he traded blows with first one man, then the other. He rolled a charging Scrawny over his shoulder as Leather Jacket tried to grab him, then kicked Leather Jacket in the shins and pivoted out of the way of a jump-kicking Scrawny. Steve landed a punch on Scrawny's left kidney but was then put in a headlock by Leather Jacket. So the SEAL elbowed Leather Jacket in the gut as Scrawny landed a body blow on him and then kicked the other man savagely in the leg. Then he turned and landed three blows in quick succession on Leather Jacket's right side, left side, and chin.

His single-minded focus on the man cost him as Scrawny kicked his leg out from under him, making Steve fell to one knee. Deciding to fight dirty, he took advantage of his position to hit Leather Jacket as hard as possible in the groin. As the big man bent over, clutching himself in agony, Steve surged upwards, landing a ferocious uppercut to the man's jaw, knocking Leather Jacket backwards. Cracking his head on the concrete floor finished putting the muscle-man out. Unfortunately for Steve, the Asian using Kenpo took the opportunity to kick Steve in the head. Although Steve went down with the blow, he managed to use a leg to sweep Scrawny's legs out from under him as well.

It wasn't long before both of them were back on their feet, hitting, kicking, and blocking one another in a vicious flurry of blows. Steve threw a punch; the other man ducked it and tried to kick him in the knee at the same time. Steve dodged the kick and swung around for another punch. He managed a glancing blow, but got a fist in his own side, too. Grunting, Steve grabbed the other man's arm and swung him into the nearest stack of crates as hard as he could.

He never fully saw the crate that was shattered over his head from behind as a fourth gang member joined the donnybrook.

{_end flashback_}

"Ah, Commander, how nice of you to join us." Machigasura's oily voice now came from where he'd positioned himself behind Danny's left shoulder. "So tell me, are you ready to cooperate now?"

"Go to hell," Steve growled, his defiant tone cheering Danny immensely. "My team knows that I would never negotiate with terrorists and criminals."

"Now, now, Commander, we both know that's not true."

"How's that?" Danny asked incredulously. "You think you've actually got a chance to get something out of holding us hostage?"

"Don't you know, Detective? The two of you are very precious commodities. We intend to use you as hostages. After all, if Victor Hesse can get ten million dollars for Detective Kelly, Five-0's black sheep, shouldn't the two of you be worth at least twenty million? And the release of our leader, of course." 

"In that case, don't you think you should stop beating us? Because dead hostages aren't worth shit," Steve spat.

"Oh, but we're not planning on killing you. We're just blowing off steam, since you and your team managed to screw up our original plan to get Naone back."

"Yeah, well, you keep blowing off steam like this, and you're liable to kill us accidently. Internal bleeding, ruptured spleens, breaking our necks, those kind of things."

Steve had his own retort on the tip of his tongue, but decided it was unnecessary after Danny's statement. Especially when his partner continued the rant after a few seconds' pause. Besides, talking was currently difficult, as it required breathing. It was a toss-up between his throat and his chest, which hurt worse; but they were both making it painfully challenging to breathe

"Besides, what happened with Hesse was different. We agreed to pay the ransom, yes. But that was just to get him into the open so that we could take him down." Steve wheezed loudly as he managed to take a gulp of air, but Danny continued anyway, trying not to let his mounting concern for his partner show on his face. "And Hesse never got to spend the money. Because he's rotting away in a Halawa jail cell. Is that what you want?"

Michigasura glared at Danny for a second before glancing upwards at Lady-Tats. Apparently he gave a nonverbal cue to start the beating again, because Steve heard the thump of fist hitting flesh, followed closely by a grunt from his partner. More blows followed in quick succession.

Danny had never before considered the possibility that he might someday be glad to be tied up. For any reason. But when Lady-Tats wound up and put all of his 250+ pounds behind a kick to the leg, only to smash his foot ran into rope rather than Danny's ACL, the detective was silently thanking his lucky stars that the bad guys had decided to tie his legs to the chair. _Sure, it still hurts, but the rope absorbed a lot of the impact and spread out the rest. Being tied up probably just saved my ACL._

_And ain't that just a kick in the head? Even the things I'm counting as lucky breaks now would be horrible under any other circumstances._

The beating continued for several minutes before Steve said something (fairly quietly, considering the way he normally yelled at any bad guy in the vicinity) and the man in charge signaled a temporary stop to hear him better.

"This won't do you any good."

"I disagree, Commander."

"We won't give in and be used like this. And knowing my teammates, unless they hear one of us on the phone, they'll never believe you have us. In which case you'll get no money."

"Then we will have our retribution for you screwing over our plans. And we will find a way to break Naone out of jail just to spite you."

"Then why hold on to us?" Danny piped in. "If you really understand that this plan is not going to work, why bother with the whole hostage and torture crap? Not that I'm anxious to die or anything, but wouldn't have been easier just to kill us?"

"First of all, Detective, I don't know this plan won't work; I simply have a backup in place in case it doesn't. And secondly, we deserve this."

"You deserve this? What the hell? You can not seriously believe you deserve the chance to beat two good men to a pulp just for the fun of it!"

Mighigasura leaned down and stared daggers into Danny's eyes as his oily voice dripped poisonously in his ear. "Not for the fun of it. For revenge. You screwed up our plans, so we have to the right to screw up yours."

"And if you accidently go too far in your revenge and kill us?" Danny asked, hoping the gangster would see reason and call a halt to the Neanderthal beatings.

"Well, then we'll just have to settle for a half a million each for the two of you. Your deaths and a million dollars will go a long way towards making us feel better about this operation's failure... And it's always nice to have the good will of the Yakuza."

_Half a million __**each**__? For us to be dead?_ Danny was shocked speechless.

_The good will of the Yakuza._ Steve mulled over the words in his mind. His eyes narrowed. _Wo-Fat._ The scowl on his face deepened into a look of murderous rage. His face was so intimidating that even Lady-Tats stepped back.

"Unless, of course, you're willing to see reason and cooperate with us."

"Like hell we will." "In your dreams, asshole." The partners answered in unison.

Lady-Tats hit Danny in the face hard enough that he ran his tongue over his teeth to check if any were now loose. Behind him, he heard a loud whuff of air as Scrawny forcefully planted his palm on Steve's chest.

"Let me know when you're ready to see reason." All three Michigasuras turned and walked out of Danny's line of sight as the beating resumed.

Just a few minutes later, Scrawny hit Steve hard enough in the face that his head flew backwards and cracked into the back of Danny's. When his eyes rolled upwards, Scrawny swore under his breath and Purple-Splash started to berate him. Lady-Tats apparently decided to join in the discussion, because he stopped beating Danny and moved to where the others were standing a little off to the side.

Danny was immensely grateful for the brief respite, which allowed him to swallow, tamp down his nausea, and try to hold back the gray creeping in around the corners of his vision as the gang members considered their options, until he felt the chair behind him start to shake. Craning his neck as much as possible, he was horrified to discover that Steve appeared to be convulsing. His muscles tightened and loosened in the dreadfully familiar rhythm of a tonic-clonic seizure.

"Help! Help him!" Danny said, frantic.

The three gangbangers looked at him, and then returned to their tête-à-tête. Scrawny ran out of the room after a minute, presumably to inform Michigasura of the newest development.

Then Purple-Splash stepped over to Danny's side.

"Perhaps now you'll be willing to cooperate."

Danny was torn. _Steve wouldn't want me to do it, would probably kill me himself if I give in and he survives. But seizures... seizures are very, very bad. I don't think I could live with myself if I just let him die._

Danny opened his mouth to say he'd make the call to their teammates- _Chin would probably be able to use it to triangulate our position, anyways. And why the hell didn't I think of that sooner? Why didn't Steve? We wouldn't just be going along with the bad guys and buying a bit of pain free time, we might even help Chin and Kono find us! Oh, wait. Steve said if we give them what they want, they'll kill us. So we can't give in. But Steve needs help now... I'll have to do it- _when the seizure stopped. Danny shut his mouth.

Purple-Splash tried to murder him with a look. When that failed, he glanced at his partner in crime, and a fist came thundering in to snap Danny's head around. Feeling the skin split on his cheek as it began to bleed, Danny tried to get his eyes to focus again so that he could hopefully avoid the next blow.

It hit him in the gut before he could ascertain which of the three Lady-Tats in front of him was real. A few more punches to his already tortured abdomen had him pulling his shoulders forward as far as his handcuffs would allow in a futile attempt to curl his body inwards. The movement only served to make his shoulders and wrists hurt almost as badly.

_Scratch that,_ Danny thought as a fist thundered into his left shoulder hard enough to snap his neck back like whiplash. _Now my shoulder hurts just as bad, maybe even worse than my belly._

A left cross split his cheek for a second time and Danny's vision began to gray along the edges. The last thing Danny felt before he slipped into unconsciousness was the worrying, terrifying shaking of the chair behind him as Steve began to convulse again.

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_**Ah, hahahahaha! I told you I'm an evil genius! And I'll fix any mistakes later. Don't be afraid to mention them in your reviews. Or you can PM me.**_

**COMING SOON TO A FANFIC NEAR YOU:**

Chapter 3: TARFUN

featuring whiny Steve, bossy Danny,

and possibly even a few more familiar faces...

**As always, I love, love, LOVE reviews.**

**They inspire me.**


	3. TARFUN

_**Congratulations, Readers!**_

You're making it obvious that you love me being mean to our heroes, because according to my stats page, Ass- Grabbing ranks

4th in number of hits,

4th in number of people who have marked a favorite,

3rd in number of alerts,

and in number of reviews, it's second only to _It Takes a Little Time, Sometimes_, a story which already has 29 chapters and has been a WIP since February 2010.

So please keep the feedback coming, I love this!

PS. For any of you who don't know, TARFUN is sometimes just TARFU, and it's pronounced with a long u sound. So TARFUN rhymes with harpoon.

_**TARFUN**_

_**Things Are Really Fucked Up Now**_

Danny considered his options one more time. _I can't believe I'm going to do this._

Then he pinched Steve's butt. Hard.

"Danno? What the hell was that for?"

"Talking wasn't waking you up and I wasn't keen on banging my already sore head into your thick, unconscious skull to wake you up. That only left one option."

"Well, fine," Steve spat with bad grace. "But did you have to do it so hard? I ought to make you rub it to make it feel better."

"In your dreams, McGarrett." Danny's voice took on a more serious tone as he continued. "But I did need you to wake up, because I just heard a whole bunch of motorcycles go tearing out of here. I couldn't overhear enough of the conversation to understand why, but I'm pretty sure there's only one or two of them left here guarding us. If we're gonna try again to make a break for it, now is probably the time."

"You try. Think I'll go back to sleep." Steve's voice started to slur towards the end of the sentence, and Danny's worry level ramped up even higher. _I didn't even know I could be more worried. After he started convulsing... please let it be shock, and not some sort of epilepsy caused by TBI. And whatever it was, the seizures didn't start until he passed out. So I've got to keep him awake. At all costs._

"Oh, no you _**don't**_, partner. I'm not going _**anywhere**_ without you. And don't you _**dare**_ fall asleep again, either. Not unless you want me to pinch you again."

"But, Danno..." Steve whined piteously. It was only because he was so worried for the SEAL that Danny didn't correct him on the use of his nickname.

"No buts!" Danny put on his firmest, laying-down-the-law father voice (which usually lasted exactly two seconds with Gracie). "Now, grab on and let's move on the count of three!"

He felt a light brush against his backside. _Geez, please, please, _**please!**_ tell me that isn't the best grip you can muster, Steve! _"Harder, Steve! If you don't use those SuperSEAL muscles, there's a very real chance that we won't move together, we'll dislocate our shoulders, and we'll fall down in a very painful heap. And my shoulder's already killing me. _**Now GET a grip!**_"

The fingers tightened slightly. _Please, oh please, oh please have enough strength to get us to the table,_ Danny silently begged. _All I'm asking for is just a little bit of help here, just a little bit of luck... _

"Alright, we're gonna head for that table over there. One of the guys set down a toolbox; we might be able to tip it enough for stuff to fall out. If I can get my hands on a small enough nail, I might be able to pick the cuffs. On three. One, two, three." Danny stood on his toes, lifting his chair by where his legs were tied to it. He felt Steve sluggishly follow his lead, so he pivoted his feet to move his chair. Steve seemed barely able to follow. The second the chairs hit the floor again (in less than a controlled manner, on Steve's side), Danny heard him wheeze again. _At this rate, it's going to take us ten years to cross the seven feet to the table. Either that, or it's going to kill Steve trying._

_Unacceptable._

_But what other choice is there? I can't just sit here and waste our chance at escape. Steve needs help now!_

_But it won't help him if you kill him trying to escape! _Danno ranted back at himself.

_I have to try. I can't tell Gracie that I gave up, that I let her Uncle Steve give up... _Danny didn't realize there were tears in his eyes as he thought of Grace. His vision hadn't improved since he'd woken again; it was still blurry and sometimes doubled.

_Besides, _he told himself,_ they're going to kill us anyway, at this rate. Whether it's part of "the plan" or not._

Just as Danny was about to rally Steve to try for another six inches, he heard the most welcome sound in the world:

"Five-O! Drop your weapons!" 

Of course, because they had Five-0's wonderful luck too, Chin and Kono's shouts were immediately followed by a bunch of gunfire. Danny closed his eyes in relief. "We're saved," he whispered to Steve.

Danny couldn't help wondering if he'd blacked out again when he opened his eyes and two Konos were suddenly in front of him, gently touching his neck- _feeling for a pulse? _**My **_pulse?_- and chattering quickly into a phone. _She must be really upset with whoever she's talking to_, he thought as her volume increased exponentially.

"_**NO**_, an ambulance is _**not**_ good enough! There's no time for that! I _**need **_a _**medivac chopper**_ with room for_** two**_ and I need it _**fifteen minutes ago**_! What part of two officers unconscious and unresponsive do you have trouble understanding?"

" 'M awake," Danny murmured. Kono looked down and met his eyes, a look of almost beatific relief coming over her face. It died a swift death as she went back to berating the dispatcher.

"Tell that pilot to put pedal to the metal to get here. I can't wake Steve, he's barely breathing, and his pulse is rapid and thready." Hearing Chin behind him was almost a happy moment for Danny- until what he was saying sank in. Danny took a big gulp of air and swallowed hard, his heart in his stomach, bile rising in his throat. _Can't wake Steve? Barely breathing? Pulse rapid and thready?_

"Dammit, Steve, I told you to stay _**awake**_!" Danny griped. _But I'll be perfectly fine with you taking your little nap if you just wake up and get better!_ Danny barely noticed as Chin came around in front of him, leaned him as far forward as he could in the chair, set Danny's head against his own shoulder, and started working on Steve's cuffs.

"Don't make me pinch you again." Unfortunately for Danny, Chin was the only one who heard the muttered threat. And before he could question it, Danny had conked out again.

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_**Author's Note:**_

Thanks to last night's all-nighter, I have most of this story already written and it only needs a little more proofreading before it's finalized. The only chapter NOT even close to being close to finished is Chapter 6, Recovery. This chapter is going to cover most of the comforting of the story; it already has three scenes: one Chin/Kono, one Kono/Grace, and one Danno/Chin. It still feels unfinished, though, which is why I'm taking requests and suggestions for who you'd like to see comforting who. I would like to get someone with Steve, but I'm not sure who yet. Anyhow, now is the time for you to vote on who gets to comfort Steve (but Danno is not really an option).


	4. SNAFU

_**SNAFU**_

_**Situation Normal: All Fucked Up**_

Hours later, Chin was sitting restlessly in the ER's waiting room. (Well, restlessly for him. If it was Steve or Danny, the few twitches and fidgets would be completely discounted; they moved more when trying to sit still.) Kono paced. Rachel had been called, and Mary, both of whom wanted updates as soon as the doctors had anything to say.

Well, when the doctors came out, the news wasn't great, but it wasn't _**quite **_as holy-shit-terrible as they thought it might be, either. When they had entered the room and found the blood and dirt-covered pair unconscious and with a few sizeable puddles of congealing blood on the floor and quite a bit more splattered around them, they had feared the worst. Trying to check Danny's pulse had made Kono want to throw up; his face had already been covered in bruises, his jaw swollen, his left eye nearly swollen shut, and his right cheek split open in two places. A long, jagged cut on the top left side of his head had coated his hair, head, and neck with blood, although there didn't appear to be any fresh blood left. The rest of him, from what she could see, had endured similar treatment. His tie was nowhere to be found and his shirt was torn in a number of places and more blood red than pin-striped blue at that point. Even his pants were probably a write-off, although the blood on them seemed to be splatter or drips, rather than directly from injuries.

Chin, on the other hand, had been less worried about the bruises and more worried about the two still-seeping wounds on Steve's side, which he had covered with a pressure bandage made from his own torn-up shirt as quickly as possible. Although they were a good sign in one respect- _**dead bodies don't bleed,**_ he'd reminded himself firmly- he couldn't help wondering, in a macabre fashion, what could have possible caused the two wounds, which although not terribly deep- they didn't look deep enough to have hit any vital organs, for instance- seemed to be the same size and shape and placed right at the end of a long bruised weal that ran the entire breadth of Steve's abdomen. When he'd gently lifted the commander's cut, wet head and seen the deep bruising all over his throat, he'd barely been able to stomach the thought of taking his pulse and respiration there. He probably wouldn't have, except that he couldn't get to Steve's wrists, and a quick check showed that both Steve and Danny's wrists were bloody, ripped to shreds, swollen, and most likely already infected.

Having seen the devastation wreaked on the partners by the vengeful gang members, the cousins were justifiably worried about their teammates. Kono continued to pace as Chin brooded. _How can he sit there so damn calmly? That kind of beating could produce serious long-term damage. It could be _**fatal**_. _

_Don't even _**think**_ like that, Kono. They'll be okay, they've got to be okay. The boss is indestructible, and Danny wouldn't dare leave Grace without her Danno. We found them in time, we got them here, the doctors will take care of them, they'll recover..._

Chin's thoughts were every bit as worried as his cousin's, and with every hour they waited to hear from the surgeons, he grew more apprehensive. Still, he'd learned over the years that pacing didn't really help someone calm down; it actually seemed to wind most people up into a greater state of tenseness. He'd also found that if he could discipline himself into providing a calm front, it would calm many people down. _People needed that a lot of times, especially if they were unlucky enough to have to be waiting for the status of their loved one with a cop. I'll have to find a way to share that with Kono without her kicking my butt. She's only a rookie, but there's no time like the present to realize that being calm to help others isn't just for crises like shootouts and hostage situations._

Their long vigil was broken by two doctors in scrubs coming through the doors together. It was apparent that they knew who they were dealing with, because neither one of them bothered to call out names; they just headed for Chin and Kono. Chin wasn't sure if it was a good thing that he recognized Ray Haleua and Min Fong; the only interaction he'd ever had with either of them was ER reports like the one he was going to get now.

"Detectives." Dr. Haleua's voice was weary. "We've been putting your teammates back together, and we're happy to announce that they're both out of danger."

Chin and Kono both breathed a deep sigh of relief.

"For the moment."

"For the moment?" Kono yelped.

"Yes. Both Commander McGarrett and Detective Williams are in critical, but stable at the moment. If the antibiotics we're pumping into them can hold off infections, and if no complications develop, and if they wake up over the course of the next three to four days, then they'll be well out of danger."

_Those first two are some big ifs,_ Chin thought. _But I refuse to even consider the alternative on that third one. They _**will **_wake up. And they _**will **_recover._

"If they make it through the next few days in good shape, we should be able to move them out of the ICU at that point, but you should both be prepared for a long recovery for both of them. This isn't going to be one of those times that Five-0 can spend four or six hours at the hospital, get patched up, and then sign yourselves out AMA to throw yourselves back into your job. It will be weeks before Williams and McGarrett are ready to be back in the field."

"Please tell us everything, doc," Chin prompted.

Dr. Fong replied, "Both Detective Williams and Commander McGarrett were dehydrated and suffering from blood loss. They've both been transfused to make up for the blood loss and are receiving nutrients through their IVs. They both have large numbers of contusions, abrasions, and lacerations, primarily on their heads, arms and chests. In addition, Commander McGarrett suffered a broken humerus, a cracked clavicle, a cracked femur, 2 broken and 7 cracked ribs. One of these ribs eventually pierced the pleural cavity, although it did not go all the way through to the lung. I can only suppose that happened immediately prior to his arrival, as very little would have been required for the rib to puncture the lung at that point. The femur has been wrapped to provide it some support, but if the Commander rests as he should, I think we can avoid casting it, since the break doesn't go all the way through."

"That's a big if..." Kono muttered.

The surgeon continued as if Kono hadn't spoken. "We've got the Commander's ribs in a brace and his arm casted and bound to his chest to help stabilize the collarbone as well. He's not currently on a ventilator; but we are watching him carefully because of the severe bruising to his trachea. If there's any stridor, we'll have to go back and intubate him after all. We'd like to avoid that if at all possible; his throat's had enough trauma already. It had already swollen quite a bit by the time the Commander was brought in, but the swelling is beginning to go down. I want to keep using the oxygen mask for a bit longer, however.

"Given the horrific torture that Commander McGarrett's body was put through, I was

quite frankly shocked and relieved to find that he did not suffer internal bleeding or organ failure. His kidneys appear to be the worst off, as they are severely bruised, but they are still functioning on their own, although not optimally. However, I am most concerned about the number and severity of concussions he sustained.

"I'm not sure if you know this or not, but concussions, or MTBIs, have cumulative effects. Each one adds to the possibility, the probability, of severe brain damage. Now, Dr. Haleua reported to me that Detective Williams informed him that Commander McGarrett was knocked unconscious a minimum of three times over the course of the twenty-six hours they were held captive. Each of those times were followed by significant periods of unconsciousness. Detective Williams also reported that the Commander suffered two bouts of what we believe to be concussive convulsions."

"Convulsions!" interrupted Chin. "As in seizures?"

"Yes." Dr. Fong nodded her head. "In approximately one and a half percent of all MTBIs, concussive convulsions occur. It has now been shown that these are not actually post-traumatic seizures, and are not necessarily indicative of post-traumatic epilepsy. I want to take a moment to emphasize here that the Commander's MRIs show no signs of structural brain damage. There is no reason to believe that he will suffer any more seizures, or any further negative effects of the concussive convulsions.

"But the fact remains, his brain has been put through the proverbial wringer by all of the blows to the head. When he was admitted, I assessed him on the GCS-

"GCS?" This time the cousins interrupted in unison.

"Glasgow Coma Scale. It rates patients based on eye response, verbal response, and motor response. A score of fifteen is normal; the lowest possible score, a three, can be given to a dead person." Dr. Fong took a deep breath before meeting the eyes of the people in front of her. "When I assessed Commander McGarrett, his score was a ten."

Chin and Kono both gasped and tears sprung into Kono's eyes. Neither were sure exactly what that entailed, but it didn't sound good. In fact, Chin thought it made it sound as though Steve was half dead.

Dr. Fong evidently read the shock and horror in their expressions, because she hurried on to explain. "But I believe that with time and care, the Commander will recover. For instance, although he didn't open his eyes when I called his name, he did mutter, "Leave me _**'lone**_, Danny. An' _**stop**_ pinching me!" before drifting off again. While the comments were inappropriate to the time and place, I believe they show that his mind is attempting to process his experience with detective Williams. Furthermore, given what he has suffered, I would have been surprised if he had scored higher than a twelve. Lowered responses are expected after head traumas."

Seeing the looks of worry remaining on the detectives' faces, Dr. Fong put on her most reassuring smile and tried again. "I know it sounds very bad, but there really is no reason to believe that Commander McGarrett will not recover fully. I just wanted to tell you everything; to prepare you for what you'll see when you enter his room in the Intensive Care Unit. He's hooked up to a heart monitor and an EEG, which monitors brainwaves, in addition to the oxygen mask and multiple IVs. I'm not trying to worry you, but I don't want you to go in there expecting to see the Commander ready to sign himself out and find yourself looking at a collection of bruises covering pale skin and broken bones and half hidden by machinery. He doesn't look like himself, and I'd rather tell you while you're sitting out here than have you walk in there, faint, and fall into some of the equipment."

Chin swallowed hard before asking the question on his and Kono's minds. "What about Danny?"

Dr. Haleua answered this time. "Detective Williams also suffered multiple grade three concussions, from what we can tell. However, he managed several lucid streaks before the we put him under for surgery, so we're slightly less worried about him. But only slightly, because Detective Williams' latest MRIs also show petechial hemorrhaging in the meninges. We will be closely monitoring this, as it increases the risk of subdural and epidural hematomas.

"Petechial hemorrhaging? Subdural and epidural hematomas?" Kono questioned, not understanding all of the doctorese.

"Petechial hemorrhaging is basically tiny bruises forming from broken capillaries. Hematomas are much larger pools of accumulated blood, often called bruises on the brain, which increase the intracranial pressure and are often fatal. Unequal pupil response, such as Detective Williams displayed on admittance, is often one of the first signs. Needless to say, we'll be keeping close tabs on the situation with frequent MRIs and CAT scans.

"We'll also be carefully monitoring him to assure that no more internal bleeding results from his injuries; we've already repaired two bleeders in his abdomen. In addition, Detective Williams suffered a large number of cracked bones. The only one that broke all the way through was his clavicle, but there are partial breaks in his sternum and every rib but one. As with Commander McGarrett, we've immobilized the arm and wrapped his ribs in a brace for support. His left zygomatic- er, cheekbone, was also badly cracked.

"Detective Williams is also currently in the ICU. As you probably know by now, visits to the ICU are supposed to be one person at a time, for no more than fifteen minutes' duration. I will make the usual concessions towards your group staying for longer periods in the future, but I can tell just by looking at the two of you that you're both so exhausted that a stiff breeze could knock you over. So tonight, you may have your fifteen minutes with each of them, but then you need to go home and _**sleep**_ for at least eight hours. Not rest, not do paperwork, but _**sleep**_. Don't just take a shower, eat, and come back; although a shower and a meal would be a good idea before you do return. You won't do either of them any good if you run yourselves into the ground. And besides, it's not likely that either of them will wake up before tomorrow anyways. They may not even wake up tomorrow; between the anesthesia and the fact that their bodies will demand sleep to heal, it may be two or possibly even three days until they wake up on their own. And honestly, lots of sleep is exactly what they need: lots of rest to heal, and a blessed obliviousness to pain."

Chin and Kono both nodded in agreement with the doctor's conditions.

"One last thing." Dr. Fong interjected. "Given the severity of their injuries, I'd like to keep Commander McGarrett and Detective Williams for at least a week after their release from the ICU, but no doubt as soon as McGarrett really wakes up, he'll be demanding to be released, AMA if necessary. Can I count on the two of you to help me keep him here as long as possible?"

The cousins exchanged looks.

"How much do you think he'll be out?" Kono asked. "The more he sleeps, the better our chances of keeping him here."

"Don't worry," Chin added, crossing his arms, iron resolve in his eyes. "He'll stay. I'll call in the big guns. If the Governor orders him to stay, he'll stay."

Both doctors sighed in relief. Past experience had taught them that all the members of Five-0 tried to get up and go back to work long before they should, but Commander McGarrett was by far the worst.

_He'd go back to work even if unable to see straight or if his organs were hanging out of gaping holes in his body, _thought Min._ And with no painkillers, to boot. All that 'I'm a SEAL, I can compartmentalize the pain, Doc' crap. But if _**he**_ has to stay, then he'll _**make **_Williams stay. Probably try to sneak into his room and pick a fight with him half a dozen times a day for the fun of it, but at least they'd both be somewhere where it's easy to put them back together again._


	5. Sit Rep

So, I thought this chapter was done... even had another version of it uploaded to add to the story... when I realized that I had given Rachel a sit-rep without doing one for Mary. So of course I had to go back and write the other half of the chapter. Sorry for keeping you all waiting. I'll try to be quick with the next chapter, too.

BTW, still taking votes on who's talking to whom in terms of the giving comfort...

And I always love reviews...

_**Sit-Rep**_

"What I don't get is why they roughed them up so bad." Kono pondered aloud as they left the hospital. "None of the other hostages had even so much as a broken nail."

"I dunno, cuz. Maybe just because they're cops." Chin answered. "Maybe because Steve and Danny pissed them off. We'll have to ask them when we wake up."

"Yeah. We can't exactly ask the bad guys, can we?" Kono's tone was completely unrepentant; she hadn't known how badly her teammates had been hurt while in the firefight, but having seen them and heard the appalling lists of their injuries, she was glad that none of the three gang members had survived the shootout. _They deserved what they got._

Chin sighed as they neared Kono's little red sports car. "We need to get in touch with Rachel and Mary. You got a preference?"

"Why don't I drop you off at your place and you can call Mary, and I'll go to Rachel's to tell her. I think I'd rather tell her in person."

"You sure, cuz? Rachel can rant every bit as well as Danny."

"Yeah. I'm sure."

"Alright, but I still think I got the easy job. Call me if you need me, okay?"

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5

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Kono punched in the code at the gate and drove right up to the house. _Danny's right. She really needs to change that code._ She sighed. _Danny._

Gathering her nerves, Kono got out of her car and knocked on the door. To her surprise, Rachel answered it herself. When she saw Kono standing there, she paled and sagged against the doorframe as her hand flew to her mouth. "He's not...?"

Kono stepped in and wrapped an arm around Rachel, offering her physical as well as emotional support. "No, Rachel, he's not dead. He's hurt badly, but the doctors expect him to recover." Taking a step towards the lavish living room, she added, "Come on, let's go sit before you fall down."

Rachel let herself be led over to the couch. After they were both settled on the seat, she raised her eyes to meet Kono's before letting them roam the room and the windows. "I'm sorry; I overreacted, I guess. I just thought... when I saw you standing there...

"You have no idea how many nightmares I've had, where Danny's partner came to tell me he was dead. The idea of that, of having a police officer, someone I knew, one of Danny's friends, coming to my door with tears in their eyes, to tell me that the love of my life was dead... that used to eat at me constantly. It was one of the things that drove us apart, that constant worry. It haunted me. It still does, in fact. Although now I usually imagine Steve, his face contorted in grief of his own, and yet trying to hide his pain and offer me support, because that's who he is.

"But when I saw you standing there, all drawn and sad, all I could think was, 'Oh, God, it's finally happened."

She met Kono's eyes again. "And you have no idea how happy I am that I was wrong."

Kono swallowed. _ Now for the hard part. I have to tell her. All of it. _"It could have been, Rachel." Kono gulped back the tears that were forming in her eyes just thinking about the possibility. "If we'd been late- if we hadn't gotten there when we did and got them help- I'm not sure how much longer they could have held out. They're both hurt bad, Rachel. Real bad. Broken bones and internal injuries and needing transfusions. Steve's on oxygen and they're both hooked up to heart monitors and EEGs. The doctors are doing repeat scans every few hours to make sure they don't start bleeding into their brains. They've got them rated on some coma scale, even though they're hopeful that they'll wake up tomorrow as the anesthesia from surgery wears off. But the doctors also said it might also be okay if they don't wake up all the way, because they're going to need a lot of sleep to heal and if they're sleeping they won't be in pain."

Kono reached for the other woman as tears streamed down her face. Wrapping her in a hug, she repeated the most important fact. "But he's alive, Rach. He's alive. Him and Steve both. They're both alive, and they're both fighters. They're gonna get better. We just gotta give 'em time, and make sure they don't overdo it, being SuperSEAL and his Backup-Man and trying to save the world."

The last sentence wrung a smile and a giggle from Rachel, although the tears didn't stop.

"My Danny? Overdo things?"

"Momma?" Grace's sleepy voice interrupted from the hallway, waking up as she realized who was sitting on the couch. "Auntie Kono?" She ran into the room and threw herself into Kono's arms. "Is Danno okay?" She pulled back to look unhappily at her favorite 'aunt'. "Mommy said you and Uncle Chin found Danno and Uncle Steve this morning, and you were gonna tell us when we could go see them as soon as the doctors told you. Why didn't you call? Why didn't you come sooner? I was really worried! Is Danno okay?"

"I'm sorry Grace. I'm sorry you had to worry for so long. Your daddy and uncle Steve were hurt bad, and it took a long time for the doctors to fix up all their hurts. They only came to tell us about your Dad," she checked her watch, "about an hour ago. And since then, all I did was visit your Dad and uncle Steve for a few minutes, drive uncle Chin home, and come here to tell you and your Mom."

"But they did fix him up, right? And we can go see Danno and Steve in the hospital tomorrow, right?"

Kono looked over at Rachel, and then back at Grace. "If your Mom says so, Gracie. But you have to realize, if you go see your Dad tomorrow, he might not be awake. The doctors said mostly all he's going to do for a pretty long time is sleep. Wake up sometimes to eat, and then fall back asleep." Kono stopped and sent Rachel a questioning look, to see if she wanted her to tell Grace more about Danny's injuries. Rachel silently nodded her okay to continue.

"The other thing is that because your Daddy's hurt, they have him hooked up to a lot of machines. He has tubes stuck in his nose to make sure he gets enough oxygen, and there are little leads..." _How do I explain this to her?_ "Um, like little stickers with wires on them, attached to your Dad's chest and head."

"Why does he need those?" interrupted Grace, her tone caught somewhere between fearful and curious. Kono hoped she could explain this without making it even more frightening to the little girl.

"Well, the wires are hooked up to monitors- TV screens- and they make pictures. The doctors look at the pictures they make and can tell how your Dad's doing... How much better he's getting," she amended.

"So my Danno's getting better?"

"Yes, Gracie, your Danno's getting better. Even though right now he has so many bruises and bandages that he looks like a half-wrapped mummy that someone decided to spray paint, he is getting better."

"Good." Grace's tone was firm.

"Now, Grace, I think you'd best be getting back off to bed," Rachel admonished. "You need to sleep, too."

"But, Mom, I wanna stay up and talk to Aunt Kono some more."

"No 'but's, young lady. Back to bed."

Kono yawned. "Don't worry, Gracie. I think I'm going to go home and go to bed, too." _I've been awake more than forty-three hours in a row now, but it feels like at least twice that long._ _This has been the longest forty hours of my entire life._

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The cell phone rang once, and Mary grabbed it so hard it shot out of her hands. She grabbed after it awkwardly, fumbling around with fingers made clumsy by worry. Finally getting the flip phone open, she started barraging it with questions even before she got it to her ear.

"Is Steve okay? What's happening? Did he wake up? Are there problems? What..."

"Shh, Mary," Chin intoned calmly, interrupting before Mary could work herself into any more of a frenzy. "Steve's in the ICU..."

"The ICU?" Mary shrieked.

"Hey, could you keep it down, lady?" asked the guy in the seat next to her. "Some of us are trying to sleep here."

Chin frowned at his phone, having clearly heard the other voice. "Mary, where are you?"

"On a plane, halfway to Hawaii. Because I'm worried out of my mind about my brother, since_** someone**_- I believe his name was Chin Ho Kelly- called me this morning to tell me he'd brought Steve to the hospital unconscious and completely unresponsive and that he'd call me back as soon as they had any news. And when, after _**four**_ hours- four freaking hours!- _**no one**_ had called me back and no one would answer their phones, I called the hospital, who told me he was still in surgery. So I got on a plane, because I _**knew**_ whatever was wrong, it had to be serious," Mary whispered, her voice every bit as her brother's SEAL growl. "Now spill! Why is my brother in the ICU? What happened to him, how bad is he hurt? He's not gonna..." she gulped, "die... is he?"

Chin sighed deeply. "The doctors say he's stable. He's really badly beat up, but they expect him to recover."

"What do you mean, beat up? A little beating wouldn't stop my brother. Dammit, we're talking about someone who threw himself out of an ambulance with a shiv stuck in his side."

'Yeah, well, this was a systematic beating that basically lasted close to twenty-six hours, with time outs only when Steve was out cold," Chin said, unaware that his statement had taken away Mary's ability to to breathe on the other end of the phone. "It involved several guys, something wooden that left splinters in his scalp, and according to the forensics team, a crowbar. They don't expect Steve to wake up for a day or two, because his head took such a beating."

"Oh. God." Mary managed to gasp. "But you said he's alive?"

"Miss? Are you okay?" one of the flight attendants laid a hand on her shoulder, having noticed Mary's sudden paleness and shallow breathing. The fact that it was after midnight in LA and over ninety percent of the passengers were asleep had made her more attentive to those still awake.

Mary lifted a hand to wave her off, but the smile she tried to paste on looked more like a grimace. "Chin?"

"Yes, Mary, he's alive. The doctors are watching him very closely, and they expect him to recover." Chin took a breath, having heard the other woman's voice over the phone. "How about you?"

"Better, now, I think."

"I doubt that."

"No, really. At least now I don't have worry trying quite so hard to rip my guts apart."

"Yeah, waiting is the worst. It doesn't matter what the doc has to say, as long as you don't have to sit there and imagine the funeral anymore, eh?"

"Yeah," Mary managed to choke out. Suddenly an awful possibility presented itself to her, and she just had to ask Chin one more thing.

"Chin... he's not... he can't.. he wouldn't want to live if..." Mary closed her eyes and steeled herself to just admit the possibility. "Steve's not gonna have brain damage, is he?"

Chin swallowed hard. He'd asked the same question while staring at his friend in the ICU. "We won't really know for sure until he wakes up, but the doctors say there's no sign of brain damage on the X-rays, CAT scans, or MRIs."

As he heard Mary start to cry, Chin tried to think of something he could say that would be comforting. In the end, he decided to take a stab at humor. "Hey, come on. We both know Steve's got a hard head. Danny once told him that the reason SWAT wears helmets and Steve doesn't is because Steve's thick skull could probably stop a bullet."

Several hundred miles away, Mary coughed out half a laugh and wiped tears off her cheeks. Swallowing, she replied, "Thanks, Chin."

"That's what ohana's for," he replied. "When does your flight get in? Do you have somewhere to stay?"

"I've got a spare key for the house." The shake in her voice told Chin exactly which house she meant.

"Do you know the security codes?"

"The key wouldn't do much good without those, would it? I'll take a cab there when I get in, and see you tomorrow at the hospital?"

"Okay. And Mary? Try not to worry. Steve'll get through this."

As he tossed his phone on the nightstand, Chin couldn't help thinking,_ I was wrong. Telling someone this kind of news over the phone is way harder than telling _**anyone **_in person could possibly be._


	6. Recovery

_**Author's Note:**_

Sorry for the long delay. This chapter got a little out of hand. I thought about posting a day at a time, but then I realized I wanted to rearrange the order of things in recovery and add more to day one, day four, day two... so I didn't. Sorry, sucks to be you all and having to wait. Hopefully this will make up for things a bit.

Since it's longer than the other six chapters combined. (Not joking! 42/71 pages in Word.)

Whew! I did not realize beforehand just how much there was to write here. And I'm pretty sure that everybody who voted for anything will get their wish here if at all possible. (Well, except the person who wanted Steve/Kono as a couple, which I don't see on the show, don't write, and which went against the wishes of at least 3 people.) I even managed to work in a way for Cath to be in the story from halfway around the world. ; )

Okay, before I go on to the story, a word about the timeline. In my brain, this is the way I envisioned the timeline:

Tuesday evening: original hostages get kidnapped.

Tuesday night, late: ransom demand gets made to HPD. Governor eventually gets woken up because they're demanding release of gang members from prison, yada, yada.

Wednesday morning, very early: Five-0 gets rousted out of bed for the case. _**Poor guys, they have to get up and work on only an hour or two of sleep. **_

Wednesday, roughly 6:00 am: (all that boring behind the scenes stuff is done) All the data's been compiled, Chin's made the list of property owned by gang; Steve splits it and the team up to check it out.

Wednesday, about 7:30 am: Steve & Danny enter the warehouse trap. The whumpathon begins.

Wednesday: Chin and Kono find the hostages, work with SWAT to free them, and get worried because they can't get in touch with Danny or Steve. So they start looking for the rest of the team.

Thursday, about 10-11 am: Chin and Kono find the guys and end the whumpathon with a trip to the hospital. _**Get me a chopper now!**_

Thursday, about 9-9:30 pm: Docs finish surgery and come out to fill Chin and Kono in.

Thursday 10-11ish pm: Sit reps to Rachel and Mary.

Friday morning, very early (1:30-2 am): Mary's plane arrives, having left on the first available flight after her 3pm-ish Hawaii time- which is -um- 9pm? LA time- call to the hospital.

Friday: "Day 1" of the guys' recovery. _**And... Cue lights! Camera! Action!**_

_**Recovery**_

**DAY 1 **(Friday)

Kono entered Steve's room the following morning to find her cousin already sitting in the chair by his bed. "How's he doing?"

"No change." Chin rubbed his thumb gently over the back of Steve's hand, which he was currently holding.

Kono was privately sure the boss-man wouldn't be too happy about that. _Too much like a caress. Wonder if that's why he's doing it? To piss Steve into waking up?_

Watching the tender movement of her cousin's thumb, Kono decided, _Maybe not. Maybe __**Chin **__finds it comforting. _Kono was seized with the sudden desire to take Steve's hand in her own, just to feel the warmth, the pulse of blood through his fingers proclaiming that Steve was indeed alive.

Instead she asked, "How's Danny?"

"The same," Chin answered. "I was in there earlier."

"Maybe I'll go sit with him. Neither of them should wake up alone."

"No," Chin breathed as his cousin left. "They shouldn't. Because their ohana's here for them."

In the next room, Kono moved the chair to the other side of the bed. Then she picked up Danny's free hand and gently started stroking the back of it with her thumb.

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"Oh, God." Mary had stopped in the doorway, completely poleaxed by the sight of her brother.

Chin's only response was to get up and wrap her in a hug, eventually rubbing her back as she stared over the top of his shoulder.

It was only when he felt his shirt starting to get wet that he ventured to say anything.

"It'll be alright. He'll recover."

Mary _**wanted **_to believe him.

She swallowed. "He just looks so... so... _**not Steve**_."

"The bruises will fade. The bones will heal, and the bandages will come off."

"That's not what I meant."

"I know." Chin backed up enough to meet Mary's eyes. "Just you wait. In a week or two, it'll be all we can do to keep him in that bed. We'll be so sick of wrangling SuperSEAL, we'll wish he was out like this again."

Mary managed a single strangled, gasping laugh. "I hope so."

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"Kono?" Chin's strained voice made her look up from Danny.

"What is it, cuz?"

"Do you have Catherine's phone number?"

_Oh, God. We forgot to call Catherine._

"No."

"So how can we get in touch with her?"

"I dunno. We can't get it from his phone, because it got smashed into a million pieces." Kono paused, then grumbled under her breath, "Overachieving bad guys... couldn't just turn the phones off or pull the batteries out, _**oh, no,**_ they had to smash them into so many pieces the CSIs couldn't even tell what pieces go to whose phone..."

"Steve's phone! Of course! Didn't he call her from headquarters once? While his phone was on the smart table? Because then I should be able to pull it from the database records." Chin had already turned and was heading for the door (presumably to go to the palace), muttering as he went. "Let's see, which case was that, again?"

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"So?" Kono pounced on Chin as soon as she saw him coming back into the ICU.

"She's stuck on the Intrepid and can't come. She wants us to keep updating her and to call her and give the phone to Steve as soon as he's coherent."

"But she's not pissed that we didn't think to call her right away?"

Chin looked away. "I may have omitted that information... and skillfully implied that it took this long to find her number, and not that I just found it because I only started looking an hour ago."

Kono threw an arm around him. "Way to go, cuz."

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Kono was trying to type up the reports for the last few days, but was having a lot of trouble concentrating. Every now and then, Danny's breath rate or pulse would speed up, and the noises coming from the monitors would change. The myriad lines on the brainwave monitor were almost hypnotic, in the same way that watching the little waveform visualizations on windows media player could be. At any rate, she was about to give up on the paperwork as a hopeless venture; she'd only managed three sentences in the last forty minutes.

Then the door opened and a tiny brunette tornado swept in, screaming, "Danno!"

Gracie stopped abruptly when her father's appearance registered. "Danno?" she whimpered.

Rachel was clutching the doorframe for support and looking like she would be sick soon.

Kono was torn between the two- _who should I comfort first?-_ when a nurse appeared behind Rachel in the doorway, wrapped an arm around her waist, and steered her back into the hallway.

Kono walked around the bed and wrapped her arms around Grace. "Don't cry, baby." She patted Grace's hair for several moments to calm her down.

"But my Danno looks so bad!" Grace pulled back from Kono. "You lied! You said Daddy was getting better!"

Tears started in Kono's eyes, and it wasn't because of the accusation. "Oh Gracie, I promise, I didn't lie to you. Your Dad is getting better; it's just going to take a _**long time**_ for him to get all the way better again."

Grace gave her a look that betrayed all of her uncertainty. "But he will get better?"

"Yes Grace, he will." Kono thought for a moment. "Do you remember when your Uncle Steve broke his arm?"

"Uh-huh."

"And he had to wear the cast for a long time, didn't he?"

"Yeah!" said Grace, brightening as she started to see where Kono was going with this. "It took months and months- like forever!- but his arm was all better when he got his cast off! He said it was as good as new!"

"That's right. And right now, your Daddy looks bad, but pretty soon they'll be able to get rid of some of the stuff around him, and his bruises will go away and he'll wake up and talk to us. And then it won't seem as bad, even though it'll probably be a long time- maybe even 'months and months'- before he gets completely better."

Grace carefully examined her father. "Can I hold Daddy's hand, or will it pull that stuff out?" she asked, pointing to the IV.

"Of course, Gracie. Of course you can hold your Daddy's hand," Kono answered, still stroking the little girl's hair. "Here, why don't I sit in the chair, and you can sit on my lap."

"Okay." Grace clambered into Kono's lap, grabbed Danny's hand, and looked hard at his face.

"Is Daddy's face always going to look like Frankenstein now, with that ugly sewing on it?"

"Oh, no, honey. Those stitches are just for a little while, to hold the skin together until it heals where it was cut."

"And will his hair grow back?"

"Of course, Gracie. The doctors just had to shave that little bit so that they could take care of that cut."

Grace was silent a moment as she turned back towards her dad and continued studying him.

"Aunt Kono, why does my Danno have tubes up his nose?"

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"Here, ma'am. Why don't you have a seat right here for a minute." The nurse handed Rachel into a chair. "Would you like a Dramamine or something to help settle your stomach?"

Rachel swallowed hard and shook her head.

"Okay then, why don't you just take it easy for a few minutes?"

When she thought she could speak safely again, Rachel commented, "I guess I hadn't really adequately prepared myself. Kono said he was badly beaten and hooked up to a lot of machines, but it didn't really all sink in. I didn't realize until I was standing there how truly horrific he would look." She gulped. "I don't think I would have let Grace come if I had known... And I should be getting back there; she was scared, I think."

"Take another minute. She'll be more upset if you go in there and pass out or puke. Besides, she's not alone; I'd bet Officer Kalakaua will be taking good care of her."

"Yes, yes, I'm sure Kono will."

"Don't worry. Once you get them to understand that it's temporary, kids usually bounce back fast. In fact, I'd say kids usually adjust to seeing someone in here before adults."

Rachel scrutinized the nurse, whose name tag identified her as Stacy. "So you always work here in the ICU?"

"Yep. It takes special training, but I think it's very rewarding. Not only do you get to help the patients who need it the most, but I think the ICU's the place where you get to see the most dramatic recoveries.

"Not to mention, this is the place where you get to see just how far the doctors will go to try to save a patient. If one of these guys takes a turn for the worse, we page the doctors and the attending is there in seconds, with the primary care physician being paged as well. And they almost always come- doesn't matter where they are- the golf course, church, the beach, grocery shopping- I once had a doctor walk in, hand me a gallon of milk, and ask me to find a place for it.

"They never give up. Even if somebody's coded ten times in the last twelve hours, they refuse to give up on him. They'll keep trying, keep bringing the guy back, keep consulting other doctors, keep trying new drugs and treatments... whatever it takes.

"And yes, there are some times when we lose somebody, but it's less often than you might think." Stacy smiled at Rachel. "We have a very good team here."

The last line made Rachel think of what a good team Five-0 were, and she swallowed hard again, trying hard not to think of her ex-husband in the bed, his partner- _oh, God! I never even asked about Steve! Kono probably thinks I'm an insensitive bitch. He's probably in here, too- and I'm sure Chin and Kono are spending as much time here as they can get away with._ "How is Steve? Uh, Commander McGarrett?"

"He's in similar condition." _Stacy couldn't help but wonder if everyone who came into the ICU for one of these two would ask about the other. Officers Kelly and Kalakaua were here before I was this morning, and they only leave one room to go to the other's; Officer McGarrett's sister asked about "Danny" _**before**_ she even went into her own brother's room; the governor- the governor!- called to ask about the two of them; and now Williams' ex turns up, and is concerned about McGarrett as well. I need to find out more about these two._ "Is he a friend?"

"Yes- well," Rachel amended, "Steve is Daniel's partner, but it's more than that. Danny told me a few months back that he was making Steve his next of kin... partially because he didn't want me to have to be called every time he -quote- 'got dragged to the ER by an overprotective SuperSEAL,' and partially because Steve's become like a brother to him. And that familial closeness extends to their whole team, who seem to have adopted Grace, and vice versa. 'Aunt' Kono is giving her surfing lessons, 'Uncle' Chin takes her out for shave ice, and 'Uncle' Steve has the best backyard in the whole wide world, according to Grace- a private beach."

"Oh." Stacy wasn't quite sure how to reply to that. The doctors and the nurses at the hospital worked well together, and she might even see one or two of them in her free time, occasionally... but she didn't consider them family.

"Well, I best be getting back to Daniel and Grace."

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Grace poked at Danny from where she sat with Kono. Since she'd run out of questions about what everything did about half an hour before, Kono wasn't sure what was going through her mind or if she should stop the little girl.

Rachel had no such qualms. "Grace, please don't poke your father."

"But Momma, that's how Daddy says to wake him up if I wake up before him."

Kono hid a smile behind her hand as she caught Rachel's eyes.

"Yes, dear, but your father's sleeping very deeply right now, and no amount of poking will wake him up."

"Then what should I do?"

"What should you do _**about what**_?"

"How do I make Danno wake up?"

Rachel smiled sadly at her daughter. "We can't do anything to wake him up. We just have to wait for your Daddy to wake up on his own."

"But it's _**boring**_!"

Once again, Kono and Rachel's eyes met. _If she's bored after two hours, this might be a _**long **_couple of days..._

So Kono tried distraction. "I haven't seen Chin and Steve for a while. How'd you like to come with me, kiddo?"

Grace looked at Rachel. "Can I, Mom? Please?"

Rachel would have agreed even if she wasn't being hit with the big eyes.

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After a half hour in Steve's room, Grace was bored again.

"Can we wake Uncle Steve up?"

"No, Grace. Both your dad and Steve need lots of sleep to get better. We have to wait until they wake up on their own."

Grace chewed on her lip for a minute. "Well, maybe if we did something fun, they'd hear us and decide they wanted to wake up and do it, too."

Chin smiled at his 'niece'. "Did you have something in mind?"

"Well..." Grace's voice trailed off as she considered things. "It should be something we can do here, so they hear us and get jealous. So it can't be something like swimming or surfing. I didn't bring a book, so we can't read to them... Danno would like that, though; he likes it when I read to him when I stay at his apartment. We can't play cards, because we don't have any. We can't play Monopoly or Life, because we don't have the boards and the money. We can't do charades, because there isn't enough room." Grace paused, barely able to speak as the emotions overwhelmed her. "Besides, I don't think I could do that without Daddy... he's the best in the whole world at charades."

To Chin and Kono's surprise, Mary was the one who saved the day by redirecting the topic of conversation before Grace could get too upset. "Oh, that's okay, Grace. I think we should save the charades for later, too. That's why I brought some cards with me. You see, I think maybe we should play a game, too. Do you know 'Go Fish'?"

"'Go Fish' is for babies," Grace declared. "Uncle Steve wouldn't want to play that." She smiled mischievously. "I think we should play poker."

"Do you know how?" Chin asked, willing to teach her.

"Of course I do, silly! Why else would I ask to play?"

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"This is ridiculous," muttered Kono, punching the elevator button harder than necessary as she went to get everyone sandwiches for lunch. "I've just been fleeced by a ten-year-old card shark."

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**DAY 2 **(Saturday)

"Uncle Chin?" Grace's small voice came from the doorway, drawing the man from his staring match with Danny's monitors.

"Yes, munchkin?" He looked behind her, and finding the space empty, asked, "Where's your mom?"

"She had a meeting, but she said I could come here and stay with my Danno since the nurse said you and Kono were here, too."

"Well, then, I think your uncle Chin needs a hug from his favorite niece." Chin opened his arms, and Grace stepped into them smiling and hugging him back one handed.

"Is it okay if I read to my Danno for a while?" Grace hefted the large, jewel-colored tome she was carrying in one hand.

"Of course, Grace." Chin stood and gave her the chair closest to the bed. "Is it okay if I stay and listen, too?"

"Okay," Grace nodded. "But is it okay if I don't start over at the beginning?"

Chin laughed, his first real laugh in days. He'd noticed when she opened the book that she was apparently about halfway through a book that was six hundred pages if it was ten. "Absolutely. You can start wherever you want."

Grace frowned at him. "No, I can't. I'm starting where me and Danno left off last weekend."

Chin relaxed back into the chair in the corner. "I'm sure he'll appreciate that."

As Grace's voice started weaving a story that somehow involved singing eggs, clues, and searching libraries after midnight for a book about water and trying not to fall asleep, Chin's head leaned into the wall as his own short-shrifting of sleep over the last few days caught up with him. He didn't even hear the little girl stop and giggle, telling him he didn't need to add sound effects to Harry falling asleep in the library before she realized he was asleep.

When he woke nearly two and a half hours later, Grace was gone and he was covered with a hospital blanket. But the laughter he heard through the wall made him curious.

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"Hey, Aunt Kono. Hi, Mary."

"Hey, monkey," Kono greeted Grace. "Run short on spending money and come to clean us out again?"

Grace giggled. "No." She smiled hugely. "But I thought of something that might cheer uncle Steve up." She pulled her bookbag off and set it on the bed next to Steve's feet.

"Oh? What did you think of?" Kono asked.

"Well, one time when I was over at Uncle Steve's house with Danno, it started raining really hard and we couldn't play on the beach anymore. But I didn't feel like watching TV, so Uncle Steve went up to his attic. He came back with a box with his name on it, and when he opened it up, it had a bunch of dolls in it."

Kono's cheeks bulged as she tried not to spray the drink of coffee she just taken all over the room. "Dolls? Steve?"

Mary was giggling, pretty sure she knew which 'dolls' were being discussed. "Did Steve call them that, Grace?"

Grace cocked her head. "How did you know, Mary? When Danno called them that, Uncle Steve looked at him _**mad**_ for a minute and said in his growly voice (she changed her own to imitate it) 'They're not _**dolls**_, they're _**action figures, **_Danno.'" She smiled as the adults laughed, both of them completely able to visualize the scene.

In a normal tone, she continued, "But whether you called them dolls like Danno or action figures like Steve, we all had fun playing with them all afternoon."

Kono and Mary laughed again. _Danny playing dolls with his daughter- sure. Big, tough SuperSEAL playing dolls- in any situation- who'd have thought?_

"Of course, Uncle Steve really needs to get more clothes for his dolls. Do you know he only has the clothes they came in? They can't even come home and change clothes after they've swum across the ocean-rug, climbed mount sofa, and arrested the bad guys!"

Mary laughed harder. Kono was half doubled over.

"So today I brought some of my dolls to play with." Grace started to pull them out of her bookbag and line them up on the bed. She ignored the howls of laughter coming from the two women from their first glimpse of the blond hair as she continued her commentary: "See, this is doctor Barbie, and this is nurse Barbie, and this is my other nurse Barbie, and this is the Barbie I'm going to make into my Navy SEAL Barbie- see how I smeared her face with mud for camouflage?- and this is my cop Barbie- see, Aunt Kono, she looks just like you!..."

"Right down to the surfboard!" Mary choked out to Kono in between laughs.

"And there's plenty enough Barbies that we can all play!"

"I think I'm leaving again," said a quiet voice from the door.

Kono and Mary's eyes met, sparkling with mischief. Neither of them had noticed Chin coming in the door, but this was too good to pass up.

"What, are you afraid to play dolls like a SEAL, cuz?" Kono said loudly as he walked out the door.

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**DAY 3 **(Sunday)

Kono entered Danny's room to the sound of a little girl's voice. She barely contained her laughter as Grace switched from her normal reading voice to a low, gruff tone with a thick (and almost correct) Yorkshire accent.

"Harry Potter?" she asked.

"Yeah," Grace replied, looking down. "Danno and I were reading it together before he got hurt. We've been reading the whole series. Every time I come over, we read together."

"I'm sure he's enjoying it," Kono said as she sat next to Grace and slipped an arm around her. "Did you come with your mom?"

"Yeah, but Step-Stan called her and she had to go outside, because cell phones aren't allowed in here." Grace put the bookmark in her book and placed it in her bookbag. "I was really hoping Danno would wake up today," she said mournfully. "I drew him a picture to make him feel better, but if he doesn't wake up, he won't get to see it."

"May I see it?" Kono asked.

Grace reached down and pulled a large, rolled up sheet of butcher paper out of her bookbag. She unrolled it across their laps to show a picture of herself and Danno swimming with the dolphins. Across the top was written "Get Well Soon"; the bottom said "Gracie Loves You, Danno". "Do you think he'll like it, Aunt Kono?"

"He'll love it, Gracie." She stood decisively. "In fact, I think we should get some tape from the nurses and hang it up right here," she said as she spread the paper out on the wall across from Danny's bed, "where it'll be the first thing your Daddy sees when he wakes up. Whaddaya think of that?"

"I think that's a good plan!" Gracie nodded enthusiastically. "I'll go get the tape!" She started to run towards the nurses' station, but stopped in the doorway. "Aunt Kono?"

"Yes, Gracie?"

"Do you think it would be okay to do this in Uncle Steve's room, too? 'Cause I made a picture for him, too."

Kono smiled at the sweet little girl. "Absolutely."

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**DAY 4 **(Monday)

That Rachel had brought Grace directly to the hospital after picking her up at school was immediately apparent as the uniformed girl came into the room.

"You're _**still **_asleep?" She addressed the man in the bed. "Come _**on**_, Danno! You need to wake up, you old lazybones!" She turned to Rachel, who'd followed her in. "Come on, Mom. Let's go see if Uncle Steve's awake."

"Why don't you take Kono with you, and I'll stay here with your Dad?"

Grace showed her agreement with this plan by holding out a hand to Kono. Meanwhile, Rachel took the chair next to the bed.

A few hours later, when she went to retrieve Grace (somewhat surprised that she hadn't come back on her own), she found them all-Chin, Kono, Mary, and Grace- engaged in another poker game. Grace and Chin had the biggest piles in front of them; Kono's was nearly gone.

_That explains it. _"Well, gang, I hate to break up the party, but I have a little girl who's overdue for supper and needs to get to bed soon so that she doesn't fall asleep in school tomorrow."

"But, Mom!"

"Maybe we," Kono nudged Mary, "should go out to supper with you. I don't think Mary's had a chance to eat anything but sandwiches and pizza since she got here." She winked at Grace. "We could make it sort of a girl's night adventure, and make Chin either stay here with our sleepyhead teammates or go home to bed, since I think his eyes are falling shut, too!"

Looking over at the older man, Rachel realized it was true he was flagging. "Sounds like a plan to me. Where shall we go?"

"The restaurant with the singing waitresses!" Gracie crowed. "Daddy hates that one."

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A couple hours later, several nurses and orderlies brought Danny back from his umpteenth MRI. As they moved him back onto the ICU bed from the gurney, one of the orderlies accidently bumped his immobilized shoulder.

Danny groaned.

His eyes flickered.

A nurse went to fetch the attending physician, but took a second to knock on the door of the next room and tell the man dozing in the chair by the bed, "I think Detective Williams may be waking up."

When the nurse returned with Dr. Fong, Chin had a hand resting on Danny's ankle and was telling him, "Sometimes pain is good, Danny. Pain tells you you're alive."

"I thought that's what all these machines were for," Danny croaked, his voice nearly gone after days of getting his fluids by IV.

Chin grinned at his teammate's acerbic reply as a nurse held out an ice chip on a spoon to him. "Don't worry, brah. As soon as the doc finishes looking you over, I'm sure she'll stick a nice big needle full of painkillers in your IV."

"Yeah, and probably put me right back to sleep before I even get a chance to see how Steve's doing," Danny groused.

"Commander McGarrett is recovering at his own pace, just as you are," Dr. Fong announced as she shone a penlight in Danny's eyes. "And you will _**not**_, I repeat, _**not**_ set back your own recovery by getting up to _**see**_ how he's doing." She gave Danny a sharp look. "Do I_** make**_ myself clear?"

"Yes, ma'am." Danny affirmed. But as the diminutive doctor put her stethoscope in her ears, he added in an accusatory whisper to Chin, "Napoleonic power-monger."

"I heard that." The petite Asian woman didn't even bother to glance up at Danny, but he still felt the reproof. Especially since she didn't bother to warm her icy stethoscope before placing it on his chest.

"Don't worry, Danny," Chin said as the doctor drew a wince and a gasp while checking her patient's ribs. "Steve's in the room right next door, and we've all been keeping an eye on both of you."

"So Steve's okay? What about the seizures? And his breathing, he wasn't breathing too -aah!" he interjected as Dr. Fong's fingers brushed a particularly painful spot, "he wasn't breathing too good there at the end. I thought he might have punctured a lung."

"Steve's unconscious, but you know as soon as I go back and tell him you woke up, his competitive streak will kick in and he'll wake up, too," Chin replied.

Danny didn't miss the dodge. "But how _**is**_ he? Is he gonna be okay?"

"It'll be a while before he's ready to play SuperSEAL again. He's pretty banged up, just like you are. But yes, the doctors are predicting a full recovery."

"Again with the **non-specific** answers. What's wrong with Steve? And don't just give me that 'all banged up' line."

"Well, what do you want me to say, Danny? Do you want me to say that between the two of you, there's so many broken and cracked bones I can't remember which ones go with who anymore?" He put his chin in his hand and pretended to think about it. "Is it Danny whose collarbone is broken all the way through, or Steve? They both have their arms immobilized." Chin threw a hand toward the door as he continued his rant. "Do you want me to go get his chart so that I can read you the list of bruised and battered organs? Do you want me to sit here and tell you all the pretty colors his skin is turning? Do you want me to tell you how many times each of you has been taken from your rooms to be scanned for internal bleeding and brain damage since you got put here last Thursday night? Do you want me to tell you how close the two of you came to dying, Danny?" Chin gripped the rail on the side of the bed and stared into his teammate's wide eyes. "Do you want me to tell you how many times Kono and I have sat with you two for hours, only talking to each other when we trade places? How many times Mary's interrogated the nurses about your and Steve's conditions? How many times Rachel's sat in this room drinking a coffee or holding your hand? How many times Gracie's been in to read to you and Steve?" Chin's voice dropped and he scrubbed a hand across his face. "Do you want me to tell you how your daughter was nearly in tears yesterday because neither her Danno nor her Uncle Steve would wake up to see the pictures she drew?" He waved a hand at the wall. "What is it you want to hear, Danny?"

Danny was speechless. Between the things Chin had said, the amount Chin had said (_I don't think I've ever heard him say so much at one time before_), and the picture on the wall (_How could I have missed Gracie's drawing? Oh, Gracie, my sweet Gracie. Danno loves you, too.),_ he was emotionally overwhelmed.

And after taking a few minutes to try to sort through his feelings without crying- _and why is that such a temptation right now, anyway? I may not have Chin's stoic mask, but I usually don't cry in front of people._- Danny came to the realization that Grace, Rachel, and Kono weren't the only ones who had been worried. However Chin may have tried to joke it off at first, it was obvious he had been worried, too. _Is probably still worried._ _Worried about Steve, and __**yes,**__ worried about me, too. _

"I'm gonna be okay, Chin."

"Hmph." Dr. Fong snorted. "_**Only**_ if you _**rest**_. And allow yourself to recover. And preferably _**don't**_ get shot or tortured or anything else violent in the near future." She stuck a needle in the IV port and pushed a dose of Demerol in. "Which I know is asking a _**lot**_ of a member of _**Five-0**_. " She said the team name almost as if it was a swear word. "Now go to sleep, Detective."

As the painkillers kicked in, Danny's eyes fell shut. But he managed to whisper, "Tell Grace Danno loves her. And thanks for the picture."

"You can tell her yourself tomorrow."

But when Chin stepped out to call Rachel and tell her Danny had woken up but was now asleep again, he passed the message along anyway. _Because you can never tell your ohana how much you care too often._

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**DAY 5 **(Tuesday)

"Hey, brah." Chin strolled into Steve's room the next morning, coffee and a bag of malasadas in hand. "Figured I'd come say hi and see if you're ready to wake up before I go bring Danny his favorite breakfast. Although if anyone asks, these malasadas're all for me.

"Kinda surprised me, there, McGarrett. Never expected Danny to hold out longer and recover sooner. What happened to all that vaunted SEAL bad-assery, eh?" The friendly tone of his voice made it clear he was teasing, as he squeezed Steve's toes. "Well, you just take your time and get better now, okay, brah? I'll be back in a bit."

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Not fifteen minutes after Chin went to give Danny half a malasada (and he had to stop there because Danny was getting nauseated), Grace appeared.

"Danno!" she yelled, running towards him, grabbing his hand, and clutching it to her chest.

"Hey, kiddo," Chin greeted her. "Shouldn't you be in school right now?"

Looking up at the detective, Grace answered, "Mumma said I don't have to today. She _**promised**_ I could stay the whole day with my Danno when he woke up, no matter what day it was, so now she has to let me. Especially since she wouldn't let me come last night when Uncle Chin called." She finished her statement by grinning widely and getting possessively closer to her dad.

Danny managed to move his hand up to cup her cheek, despite the small hands still holding on to him tightly. "I missed you too, Monkey."

"Well, if you get the whole day with your daddy, I think maybe I'll go to the office for the first time in nearly a week," Chin said. Then he yawned. "Or maybe I'll go catch some Zs in a real bed."

Chin looked up from Grace to see Danny opening his mouth, and interrupted before Danny could verbalize the concerns on his face. And even if he did turn to look at Grace while he was speaking, his words were just as much for Danny. "But you won't be alone, Grace, not even if your Dad falls asleep again. I saw Mary on her way into Steve's room as I was coming in here, and I think Kono's probably gonna get here in a just a little bit. And if you need me, you know you can call me, right?"

"Of course, Uncle Chin. I'll call you when Uncle Steve wakes up."

"You think he'll wake up before I get back?"

Grace gave him a 'duh' look. "Daddy's awake, and he's usually the one who likes to sleep in."

"Well, I hope you're right, but remember, Uncle Steve needs a lot of sleep, so if he doesn't..."

"I know, I know, don't feel too bad, it's not my fault..." the sing-song manner Grace used had Danny shooting a look at Chin, who just shrugged, as if to say, 'Well, what do you expect? She _**has**_ heard that a lot more than once in the last few days.'

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_The air in this tank is really old,_ thought Steve. _I didn't realize it'd been that long since I used my scuba tanks. This stuff tastes like metal and plastic._

_Wait a minute. If I'm diving, why can't I see anything? You don't go on a solo dive without a light. So why can't I see anything?_

_And why is it so hard to move? Forget a weight belt, I feel like I've got weights all over me. Shit, even my chest feels weighted. And my head, oh, God, please make it stop. Ringing..._

_Explosion? Was that what happened?_

_No, that doesn't seem right. _

"Nnnngh." Steve turned his head. _What's that noise? It sounds like someone groaning, but that can't be right. People don't groan underwater. They can't._

"Steve?"

_Whose voice is that?_

"Can you hear me, Steve?"

_I know that voice... that voice is a good voice. It means caring. Love..._

"Open your eyes for me, big bro. Please?"

_Big bro? Mary..._

_Wait, why is Mary here? And how is she..._

"Tokkin unnerwahr?" Steve's slurred words made no sense to his sister, but she pressed the call button again, anyway. _Maybe he's finally waking up!_ she thought excitely.

_Mmmm... so heavy..._

Steve felt himself drifting deeper... deeper... deeper into the depths of the ocean. But even though a part of his mind told him he should be worried, he just couldn't do it. The feeling of safety was too strong.

He never realized that Mary had picked up his hand, or that he had closed his fingers around hers.

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"Aunt Kono! the doctors are going into uncle Steve's room! Can we go see if he finally woke up? Can we? Please?"

"Whazzat, Monkey?" Danny's sleepy voice came from the bed.

"Daddy! You woke up again! I'm so glad!" Grace realized her tone of voice was not helping when Danny winced, and carefully took a minute to drop it to a near-whisper for his sake. "I was just telling Aunt Kono that a bunch of doctors just went into Uncle Steve's room. I wanna go see if he finally woke up. Can I? Please, Danno?" She pulled out the pouty lip and eyes the size of dinner plates to add to the pleading.

"No! No! Not the face!" Danny threw a hand in the air as if to block the look on his daughter's face. "You know I can't resist the face."

"Please?"

Danny sighed. "Okay, monkey. But you should wait a minute. The doctors might need a minute to make sure Steve's okay."

"O-kay." Grace crossed her arms over her chest. "But I don't want to wait too long and have him fall asleep again."

"Don't worry, Grace, we'll go over as soon as the doctors leave."

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It was only about ten minutes later that Grace rushed into the room. Seeing Steve's eyes still shut, she whined, "I knew it. I knew if we waited too long, he'd fall asleep again."

Kono, on the other hand, noticed Mary's teary eyes and the way she was tightly clutching Steve's hand. "Grace, honey, why don't you go tell your Dad that Steve's still out."

"But Aunt Kono..."

"Please, Grace."

After the door shut behind the little girl, Kono put her arms around Mary. "What is it?"

"I feel like whining, too," Mary sobbed. "Just like Grace."

Kono rubbed her back. "Go ahead."

"I thought he was waking up. I really did. It made me happy, _**so happy!**_ just because he groaned and was twitching a little. And then I held his hand and I swear- I swear to you!- he closed his fingers around my hand! I was so excited. And he mumbled something... I couldn't tell what it was, but he made a noise. I really thought that was it, he was going to wake up and be okay..." Mary's voice trailed off.

Kono could guess what was coming next. "But he didn't."

Mary sobbed. "No."

"Why were the doctors here?" 

"When I thought he was waking up, I pushed the call button, like they said to. But when they got in here, all I got was doctor-speak about upgrading his status and how people don't usually come around all at once like in the movies, and the fact that his brainwaves were showing a REM sleep, even if it was only for a few minutes, showed definite improvement and this was a good sign, yadda, yadda, yadda..."

Mary sobbed heavily. "But I couldn't have cared less. It just felt like such a let-down, you know? I didn't want to hear that this was a step in the right direction to him waking up, I wanted him to wake up. All the way. I wanted to see those beautiful eyes, hear him say actual words..."

"And it just seems harder to come so close and then not have it happen." Kono finished.

"Yeah."

"Listen, Mary, why don't I go say goodbye to the others for a few minutes, and then drive you home. I think a nap would probably be good for you. You're tired, you're stressed, and a break might me nice."

Mary sniffed. "I dunno. I don't want to go to far. I want to be here if he does wake up... And I've barely spent five minutes with Danny since he woke up..."

"Take a break and then come back to see Danny. It'll be okay. Trust me, if anybody understands you spending most of your time with your brother, it's Danny."

"Okay."

"Alright, why don't you just grab your stuff. I'm just gonna pop in and tell Danny and Grace we're going."

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As soon as Kono popped her head through the door, Danny started talking. "What's going on? Grace said you told her to come back here. Is Steve worse? Did something happen? What's going on?"

"Steve had a dream. Mary thought he was waking up, but he didn't. The doctors say it's a good thing, but the near miss was draining for Mary. I'm gonna take her home now. I should be back in 45 minutes to an hour. Need anything else?"

Danny was still three sentences behind when Kono finished. When his brain caught up, all he said was, "Grace..."

Understanding that he didn't want her left alone when he was barely able to stay awake fifteen minutes at a time due to the drugs, Kono turned to her. "Hey, Grace. How about coming for a ride with me and Mary in my car?" Glancing at the clock, she added, "And maybe we'll stop and pick up a pizza for lunch on the way back to see your dad."

Grace looked at Danno, who nodded sleepily, already dozing again. "Okay."

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When Rachel arrived, she was slightly panicked at first that she couldn't find Grace in either room. Danny woke up and filled her in. At his request, she went to check on Steve.

"Hey there, Commander. I hear you've been putting people through the wringer today. Don't you think you should stop messing around and wake up for real?

"I'd really appreciate it if you did. Daniel and Grace are both worried about you, and it would make both of them feel better. And a happy Danny would be nice. I think we're all missing the sound of you two teasing each other and fighting good-naturedly. Not to mention, Grace gets more and more disappointed every time she visits and you're still asleep.

"Of course, that's just two pieces of the puzzle. Kono introduced me to your charming sister, who I think would be simply delightful company under normal circumstances but who is currently extremely worried about you. And I swear, Kono and Chin look more worn out every time that I see them. I think I even saw Chin dozing while doing something on his laptop Sunday. And if I were to guess, I would say that at least part of the reason that Kono keeps going on coffee runs for everyone is because she needs the coffee to wake herself up. When she's not sneaking Monsters out of her backpack.

"Not to mention, I want you to wake up and get better. You're a nice person, but I as much as I'd like you to get better for your own sake, I must admit my own reasons for wanting you to get better, Commander, are more than a little selfish. I want you to get better because I want my family to be happy, and if you don't, they're going to be devastated. I want you to get better because I don't want to see Grace crying her eyes out about her Uncle Steve. I want you to get better because I want you to keep being Danny's partner. I know there have been times when the two of you've gotten hurt- this time, for example- but I really do think that the best way to keep Danny safe is for him to have you watching his back.

"Which is why I really want you to hurry up and wake up now. I mean it, Commander. It's time to wake up, Steve. Wake up." Rachel waved her arms in a grotesque parody of her ex-husband. "Steven! Wake up! NOW! Come on, McGarrett, wake the hell up!"

After commanding Steve to wake up several more times, each time dwindling in force and volume, Rachel gave up, wrapped her arms around her stomach, and went back to Danny to report that her ranting wasn't enough to wake him up.

"But my ranting isn't as good as yours, Daniel. Never has been. You know that..."

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The door opened and Grace came running in. "Mom! Danno! Guess what!"

"I dunno. What's got you so excited, Monkey?" Danny teased the little girl who jumped up on his bed next to his feet.

"Aunt Kono let me pick the toppings for the pizza! And we got two! _**And **_she said if I want, I can have three pieces! Three! Can you believe it?"

"No, I can't." Danny's tone was droll.

Kono's grin was wide as she approached the bed. "Well, other-boss, I figured as soon as you saw what toppings your daughter chose, you wouldn't want any, and she could have your piece."

"What? My daughter knows how to make a pizza properly. With real toppings, like mozz and pepperoni and ..."

Kono flipped the lid of the pizza box open.

"Pineapple." Danny closed his eyes and tilted his head back into the pillow. "How can this have happened? My own daughter, tainted by this insane island..."

"Danno, you should try it before you say you don't like it." Danny opened his eyes and rolled them at his daughter. _ What a time to have my own words thrown back in my face. _

"This is Kono's favorite, you know. Pepperoni and pineapple. And it's _**really **_yummy."

Kono handed the top box to Chin, who had followed her into Danny's room. "Don't worry, we got one you'll like, too. See?" She flipped open the second box to reveal a pie smothered in Italian sausage, beef, pepperoni, onions, and extra cheese.

Danny inhaled deeply and sighed in pleasure. "Now that's a pizza."

"Yeah, brah, but I'm pretty sure it's contraband for you, so if you're planning to sneak a piece, I'd hurry up before one of your docs comes in to do rounds." Chin said while taking a slice of "Danny's" pizza to go with the slice of "Kono's" already on his plate.

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Mmmm... _that smells good..._

_Pizza..._

_With pineapple..._

_Danno would be so outraged..._

Chin had looked up at the slight noise and nearly dropped his pizza when he saw the corners of Steve's mouth turn up the tiniest bit.

"Steve? You awake, brah?"

_So tired..._

_Save me some of that pizza, okay?_

"Steve?"

_I'll eat it later..._

_Ham and pineapple's good cold._

Chin leaned back in the chair as the smirk melted off Steve's face and the monitors around recorded his drop from dreamland back into obliviousness. _But I _**didn't **_imagine that. The pain in the ass was _**smirking**_ at me, even if he wouldn't open his eyes._

_Wait 'til I tell Danny._

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"Come on, doc, please?" Danny pled. "I'll go in a wheelchair, I'll take all the stuff you want with me; shoot, you can escort me if you want. Besides, it's not like you haven't disconnected me from all this stuff before... they said you've been taking me out of here for tests five or six times a day. Come on, doc, just five minutes to go next door-next freaking door, not the moon!- and see my partner, maybe give him a little bit of a talking to for worrying everyone like this..."

"Knowing Steve, he'd probably wake up just to argue with him," Kono remarked in an undertone to Chin while the doctor denied the request yet again.

"Come on! I'm not even asking to leave the ICU!"

"And I said no, and that's final!" The young attending doctor was beginning to wish he had claimed he was on the way to emergency surgery or something when the woman had grabbed him- 'Just for a moment. I just need you to talk some sense into my ex-husband." _Huh, easier said than done. Every time I say no, he just keeps right on arguing._

He'd grabbed the chart, looked over it again cursorily to remind himself which of the four in the unit it was- and entered chaos. _Now I want to tear my hair out. Or give the nurses battle pay. Or something. Why is this man so stubborn?_

"Detective, may I remind you that less than twenty-four hours ago, you were still in a coma yourself? You're still healing from internal injuries, you have more cracked and broken bones than I can count, and the nurses only disconnected you from the EEG an hour ago! You are in no condition to go anywhere, for anything!"

"But doc, I just want to go wake Steve up. When Dr. Haleua was in this morning, I heard him tell Chin he expected him to wake up by yesterday, and if he didn't wake up today, he was going to take him off the painkillers completely. So why not let me take a crack at it first?

"I'm sure someone else is equally capable of going into the Commander's room and talking to him..."

"But doc, I'm the one of the very few people he actually listens to!"

The young surgeon ignored the chuckles from the peanut gallery in the corner. "That is enough! This is the last time I am telling you no for the last time! And if you keep arguing with me about this now, I will do my best to make sure that they make you wait an extra day when you are well enough for a visit!"

With that, he left the room, angrily flinging the chart back into the clear plastic holder outside the door and muttering under his breath about reckless, stubborn patients. Stacy looked up from the nurses' station and asked, "Troubles, Dr. Mallory?"

"No, no... nothing I can't handle. Just that that idiot Williams is asking to go visit his buddy McGarrett. I mean, what the hell? Does he really think he's going to be allowed out of bed less than twenty-four hours after waking from a coma? And with as many severe injuries as he had? And his buddy's still in a coma!"

Stacy couldn't help chuckling herself.

"What's that for?"

The nurse immediately sobered a bit. "Oh, you wouldn't know, because you haven't been in here the last few days... but this is my third twelve since those two were brought in, and the amount of mother-henning going on in those two rooms is incredible. Not to mention, every single person who has been in to visit one of them has at least asked about the other one, and most of them split their time between the two fairly equally. Drs. Haleua and Fong left orders not to bother trying to fight their "family" (she did air quotes around the word)- half of whom aren't related to either one of them."

"You mean this sort of madness has been going on all week?"

"You think this is exciting, you should have been here when William's little girl was trying to get Detective Kelly to play barbies with her in the hopes that Commander McGarrett would get jealous and wake up to play with her."

Dr. Mallory frowned in puzzlement. "I thought he was an army tough guy or something."

"Navy SEAL."

"And she expected him to wake up jealous and wanting to play barbies?"

Stacy giggled. "Yeah."

"So what you're saying is that the insanity is either contagious or hereditary?"

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The first thing Steve was aware of as he started to wake up was the snoring.

_Man, Cath's got a bad cold._

_I don't thing I've ever heard her snore that loudly before._

_What's that beeping?_

_And why do I feel like I've been run over by a truck?_

Disjointed memories flashed through his consciousness. Crates and thugs and being handcuffed to a chair. _Oh yeah, that's why I feel so shitty._

_Which means... _

Steve moved his free arm slightly, just enough for his fingertips to run into the rail.

_Yep, hospital._

_Yay._

_Wait a second, if I'm in the hospital, then _**is it**_ Cath snoring?_

He cracked an eye open. Even in the dark, it was enough to make him slightly dizzy. He closed his eyes again.

_Man, oh man, what _**have**_ they got me on this time?_

Steve took a deep breath. _Okay, let's try that again._

This time it was easier. His eyes examined the figure in the corner. Sitting and sleeping in one of those awful hospital chairs.

It took him less than three seconds to decide. _That's not Cath._

_Cath wouldn't be able to sleep like that- one knee up, with the arm propped on top, head tilted almost ninety degrees to lay on top of her arm._

_That explains the snore._

_Long straight hair._

_Kono?_

_Oh-kay. That's unexpected._

_If it wasn't Cath, I think the most likely person to be haunting my room in the middle of the night would be Danny..._

_Danny..._ More images flashed through his head. A crate smashing over his partner's head...

_Danny..._

...feeling Danny handcuffed to his chair...

_Danno!..._

The beeping of his heart monitor sped up.

...worrying about how long Danno'd been out...

"Danno!" His mind was screaming the name, but it came out as a weak whisper.

But Kono had already started coming around because of the beeping, so she heard it. "Steve!"

"Kono," Steve swallowed, "Danno?..." _Shit, it hurts to talk._

"Shhh, don't talk too much. I'm pushing the button to get the doctor. Just let him check you over, okay brah?"

Steve managed to grab Kono's wrist weakly as she pushed the call button on his bed. Squeezing slightly, he got Kono to meet his eyes again. "Danno... okay?"

"Danny's going to be just fine, boss. He's banged up a bit, same as you are, but he actually woke up last night. He'll be real glad when I tell him you're awake; he had quite the argument earlier today about coming in to see you."

"Woke... up?"

Kono stroked Steve's hair back from his face and forced herself to meet his eyes. "Yeah, boss. You were both in comas for several..."

The lights came on and Steve flinched at the brightness. Seeing Steve awake in the bed, the nurse turned around and went back out to page the doctor.

"...days." Kono finished.

"Gang?" Steve managed to ask, eyes half-closed against the unwelcome light.

Kono shook her head in disbelief and dismay. "Bo-ss." She closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead. "Only you would be worrying about something like that two minutes after being in a coma for days."

Steve didn't need words to prompt an answer. His look said enough.

"Alright, alright. The four guys who were there when we busted you two out of the warehouse all ended up dead in a shootout. There were three other deaths when we rescued the hostages; two more got injured in the firefight. The other four we caught are in jail. As for the rest of the gang... we haven't got around to going after them yet."

"Hostages?"

"They're all fine. Chin and I wondered about that; none of them ..."

"Excuse me," Ray Haleua interrupted, looking at Steve over Kono's shoulder. "But I really should examine Commander McGarrett while he is awake. He probably won't stay awake too long at a time."

"By all means, doc. I'd rather not be interrogated about the case by someone who can only whisper his questions a single word at a time."

"What?" Dr. Haleua looked at her askance.

Steve hadn't let go of her wrist yet, so he gave it another squeeze and asked, "None of them?"

"None of the hostages was hurt at all. Not even a scratch. They weren't even tied up; just locked in a room. They're fine, boss.

"Now can I please have my arm back?"

"Yes, Commander, why don't let the detective go? I think we can skip the memory questions, but I do still need to examine you."

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The phone rang and Chin fumbled for it sleepily. "Yeah?"

"Chin." He could hear the smile in Kono's voice as he sat up. "Steve's awake."

Chin sighed. "Thank God."

"Yeah? Wait 'til I tell you what the first words out of his mouth were."

"How's Danny?" Chin guessed.

"Right on. Followed closely by questions about the gang and the hostages. And an unhappy glare at me when I said we'd been too busy the last few days to track down the gang members we haven't caught yet."

Chin groaned. "Seriously?"

"Have you called the governor yet?"

"No, but I'm thinking that may have just got moved to the top of my to-do list for tomorrow morning." He rubbed his face. "That's gonna be so fun.- Why hello Governor, good morning to you, too. I'm calling to update you on the fact that McGarrett woke up last night. Oh, and by the way, could you order him to take several days off from the case and stay in the hospital? Thanks." He rubbed his face again. "I don't know how Danny does it."

"Well, while you're pondering that, do you want to call Mary? I'll call Cath and tell Danny."

"Alright, cuz. See you in the morning."

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When Kono's call went straight to voicemail, she decided to leave the simplest message possible for Cath.

"Hey Cath, it's Kono. Just wanted to let you know Steve's awake and it looks like he's gonna be fine."

She ended the call by reciting both her cell number and the phone extension for Steve's room.

Then she headed upstairs to Danny's room. Peeking her head in the door, she whispered, "Psst! You awake, Danny?"

"I am now," Danny answered in a normal voice. "What's up?"

"Steve's awake."

"Good."

Kono raised her eyebrows. She'd expected more of a reaction than that. Apparently, though, it just took Danny a little longer to wind himself up into a proper rant with only one hand free to wave.

"Trust SuperSEAL to wake up from his coma in the middle of the night. His body's internal clock probably thinks this is a normal time to wake up. Gotta have time for the triathlon before you start the day, right?

"Well, you know what? He can just wait until a sensible hour. I have nothing to say to him in the middle of the night, except..." Danny's voice trailed off.

"Tell the big lug I'm glad he's not asleep anymore."

"Will do, Other-boss. Oh, and just so you know, he's glad you're okay, too. You were the first thing he asked about."

Danny turned his head and blinked back tears. _Must. Not. Cry. in front of the rookie. C'mon, be tough, man. Just because you're relieved Steve's okay and touched by the fact that he asked about you, that's no reason to break down._

"Did you call everyone?" he managed to ask, his voice thick.

"I called Chin and left a voicemail for Cath. Chin's gonna call Mary."

"Oh, that's good."

Kono thought Danny sounded like he was starting to fall asleep again, so she said good-night and headed back to the room next door.

Steve was already asleep again. Dr. Kaleua was just finishing making notes on his chart as she came in.

"Well, doc?"

"The commander is making excellent progress so far. I am somewhat concerned, however, that the first thing he did when he woke up was question you about the case. He needs to take some time off from that."

"Chin's going to call the governor first thing in the morning."

"That's great. But you and I both know, even if he's here, he'll probably find ways to try to work around that. So from now on, as long as he's in the hospital, don't say a word to him about the case." He grinned. "Doctor's orders."

He was halfway out the door before the comeback occurred to Kono. "Hey, can I get a script for that?"

"No, detective. But I'd be happy to write you one for a sedative if you and Detective Kelly don't start going home to sleep more than every other night."

"Well, the rotation was so that neither of them would wake up without their ohana. Now that they're both out of their comas, we won't need to."

"So you'll go home now?"

"Well," Kono stammered. "I'll probably stick around a little longer, make sure Steve doesn't end up with nightmares or flashbacks or anything like that, check on them both again before I head out again. But I probably won't sleep here again after tonight, okay?"

Ray shook his head as he left the room. _Given the grilling the Commander had tried to give me- _**ME!**_- to find out more about Detective Williams' condition, there's probably more danger of the man reinjuring himself trying to go see his friend than from having a nightmare-induced panic attack. Not to mention, if he does end up with nightmares, I doubt he'd want anyone else to be privy to it._

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**DAY 6 **(Wednesday)

When Steve woke up the next morning, the first thing he noticed was the crayon drawing taped to the wall across from his bed. It showed an enormous sand castle being assaulted by a mixed task force of GI Joes and barbies, who were being held by himself and a short brunette. Above and below the picture were the words: "Get Well Soon, Uncle Steve. Love, Grace."

The second thing he noticed was that the rolling table in front of him had several sticky notes stuck to it. They read:

"Steve- sorry to duck out on you before you wake up this morning, but I'll be back soon. Kono."

"PS. You'll probably have lots of other visitors today, too."

"Dr. Kaleua said he's prescribing a ban on talking about the case here. So don't expect an update when I get back."

"Danno's really glad you're awake again."

"If you want to talk to him, his extension is ICU2 (4282)."

The last note, combined with the fact that Kono had set the black bakelite phone on the table next to it, was the one that Steve was most interested in.

_As soon as I get these damn tears out of my eyes, I'm going to call Danno. Well, and get rid of the lump in my throat._

It took a few minutes, but Steve managed. He dialed the number, and listened to the phone ring.

He could hear it ring through the wall as well as the receiver.

There were several very loud grunts, punctuated by a loud ker-thunk and a not-so-muffled obscenity.

"Danno?" Steve abandoned the phone and raised his voice.

"Steve?" Danny shouted back through the walls.

_Damn, the lump is back._ Steve swallowed. "Good to hear your voice!"

"Yours, too!"

"Trouble with the phone?"

Danny could hear the smirk in Steve's tone. "That was you, wasn't it? I should have known! Only an asshole like you would try to call me on the phone when it's sitting on the table that's two feet from the wrong side of the bed!"

"Speaking of the wrong side of the bed, sounds like you woke up on it!"

"Maybe I did! Some jackass, who shall remain nameless, went and woke me up out of a great dream..."

"Blond, brunette, or redhead?"

"Not that kind of dream, you shit! Anyways, as I was saying, some jackass went and woke me up at like 6:10 in the morning so that we could yell a conversation through a wall while he smirks at my misfortune in having my arm strapped to my chest, and my resultant inability to grab the phone on that side of the beh..."

Danno's voice cut off mid-word, and Steve was opening his mouth to ask him if something was wrong when he was glared into silence by the nurse standing in the doorway, hands akimbo, and a fierce look on her face.

"What do you two think you are doing? This is a _**hospital**_! More than that, this is the ICU! We do not shout through the walls at other patients! Especially not this early in the morning!"

"Okay."

The nurse raised an eyebrow. She'd been warned about these two; she hadn't expected her charge to surrender so easily.

"How 'bout a visit?"

"I don't think so."

"Aw, come on. I'll even let you throw me in the wheelchair."

"As tempting as that is, Commander, the answer is still no. If you want to talk to Detective Williams, you'll just have to use the phone."

"I actually tried the phone first, but Danno's having a little trouble with his. Don't suppose you could go straighten that out, could you?"

"I'm sure that Aheahe will take care of that. Have a nice day, Commander."

As soon as the door closed behind her, Steve redialed Danny's phone. When he picked up, Steve said, "I just got _**froze **_by an ice queen. You?"

"Ditto."

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Forty minutes later, Chin arrived with Mary. He walked into Steve's room and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Who you on the phone with, brah?"

"Danno."

"Yeah, well, you better get off of there soon. Cath's tried to call you three times this morning, and all she can get is a busy signal."

"Not to mention, I could use a hello," Mary added.

Steve did a double take when his eyes slid past Chin to Mary. His whole face brightened with his smile. "Mary!" he smiled, and said goodbye to Danny. Then Steve resumed talking to his sister, joy evident in his voice. "When did you get here?"

"Early last Friday." Mary smiled back at her brother.

"Friday? How long?" Steve directed the second question at Chin; he was trying to piece together the timeline in his head.

"How long what, brah?"

"Wasn't it Wednesday when we started the case?"

"Yeah."

"So how did Mary get here by Friday?"

"I flew while you spent Thursday in surgery," Mary answered.

"I spent Thursday in surgery?"

"You and Danny both," Chin answered.

"I could have sworn we were in that warehouse more than one day..." Steve's voice trailed off as something else occurred to him. "What day is today?"

"Wednesday."

"Wednesday! You mean it's been a whole week?"

"Yeah, brah."

"Shit." The look on Steve's face was an insane mixture of little boy lost and someone whose brain has just shut down completely.

"Don't worry Steve." Mary took his good hand; Chin left quietly, sensing that the siblings might need some time on their own.

Steve shook his head as if to clear it. "I'm not worried. It's just that I've never been out that long. It's kind of... disconcerting."

"I happen to think that's a major understatement."

Looking carefully at his sister, Steve saw barely-brushed hair that spoke of her hurry; wrinkled clothes that had obviously spent the night in the dryer because she hadn't stayed awake to get them out; a missing watch that spoke of her distraction; stooped shoulders and tired bags under red eyes that told him she hadn't been sleeping well and crying more than a little; new worry lines inscribed on her face; and a tired, gentle smile that said it was all his fault, but it was slowly abating.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"Worrying you. Making you come halfway around the world to sit a vigil with me."

"It's not your fault. Not like you planned to get captured and have the shit kicked out of you, is it?"

"No," Steve replied, "but Danno says if someone's hurt because of you, you say sorry even if you didn't hurt them yourself."

Mary's smile widened as she brushed Steve's hair back. "He's good for you. Smooth out some of your rough edges."

"Yeah, he's good at smoothing ruffled feathers. Even tells me how I should smooth over his ruffled feathers most of the time."

The phone rang.

"Speaking of which..."

"Huh?"

The phone rang again.

"Twenty says that's Cath." He paused. "And I'm probably going to either get the ass-chewing of my life, or the super-stoic 'if I let myself feel anything, I'm going to bust into a million bawling pieces' intelligence officer facade." He set his hand on the telephone. "And if I don't answer before it rings again, my ass is grass."

"Don't let me hold you up," Mary said as she began moseying towards the door.

Steve picked up the phone. "Hello?"

It wasn't Cath. It was the governor, calling to order to Steve to stay in the hospital. And if he left AMA this time, he wouldn't have a job to come back to.

Steve was 90% sure it was a bluff; but not willing to chance that other 10%. _This job, this place, these people, mean too much to me to risk that. Well, at least, to risk that __**yet**__._

Cath called five minutes later, and Steve once again answered the phone with a "Hello?"

"Steve," Cath breathed an audible sigh of relief. "You owe me like a dozen steak dinners for this. You know that, don't you?" Only someone who knew her well would have picked up on the slight waver in her tone.

"It's not my fault?"

"Try again, sailor. It is entirely your fault that I've been so worried and distracted and all-around strung-out looking the last few days that my watch commander last night had me escorted out for a piss test."

Steve swallowed. He wouldn't have imagined that happening, ever.

"Steve?"

"Still here." He gulped again. "Just having trouble imagining you in a state to warrant that."

"Yeah, well, it's not so much that I look like I'm falling apart- although I won't deny the dark circles under red eyes- it's more that I've been having trouble concentrating for the last week. To the tune of a late report, which has never happened before, and staring at my computer screen without reading or typing for more than five minutes while someone called my name last night."

"Jeez, Cath, I'm sorry." _Sorry for worrying you. Sorry that I can't hold you right now, because I can hear the waver in your voice growing. I can hear you getting closer to tears, and I can't do anything about it._ "I'm so sorry."

"Yeah, well, let's just say that while they weren't willing to give me leave last week to visit a sick friend, they're considering giving me leave to see someone who's got me this distracted, especially since I threw your chart and that picture of you on my CO's desk to explain why I was so upset and distracted."

"How'd you get my chart? And what photo?"

"Your chart was simple enough... you know my skills. And the photo... well, before I got my hands on your chart, I begged Chin to send me a picture of you. I figured, what's a couple broken bones? Seeing you, even just in a picture, would help me feel better.

"Chin knew better. He fought me. He didn't want to send it. He started making excuses- he couldn't use his cell in the ICU, nobody ever looks good in a hospital picture, you know the drill- but after three calls in less than six hours just to bug him, he finally gave in and sent me one.

"It was horrible. All those wires and tubes on you; all those bandages and bruises. And you were so still. So still, and so pale. You didn't even _**look**_ like you, Steve. I couldn't imagine what kind of beating could turn someone who usually looks like a bronze statue of a Greek god in perpetual motion into such a pathetic, wan body in a bed.

"And I should have learned my lesson with that," Cath sobbed, "but _**no-o**_. I _**had**_ to go digging. I wanted to know exactly how you were injured. I wanted a list of your injuries and to know everything the doctors knew, so I got your chart. And I backtraced the stuff I've sent you guys to get access to the Five-0 office computers, so I could get access to all of the notes on the case, all of the forensics data, all the reports that came in.

"And if it was hard knowing you were hurt, it was twice as hard seeing that first picture from Chin. Reading your chart was twice as bad as that. But reading the forensics report and seeing the pictures, my _**God**_, that was a million times worse... The first picture in that file made me run for the head and puke- you and Danny cuffed there in a puddle of your own blood, Danny leaning on Chin, bleeding all down his back and Chin doing something with your handcuffs while Kono had her hand on your neck and was screaming into her cell- you could see she was screaming in that picture, her face all contorted as the crime techs tried to get pictures of where evidence was, collect samples and stuff, before the EMTs arrived and then the next picture, they were there with gurneys in the background, but the picture was focused on footprints in the blood- your blood!- and the very idea of th..."

"Shhh, shhh." Steve made soothing noises into the phone. _When was the last time I heard Cath babble? It was when her Dad died... Oh, shit, oh shit, oh shit._ "Cath, Cath, sweetie, it's okay, I'm okay."

"Don't lie to me, Steven! I _**know**_ you're not okay!"

"But I will be, Cath. I will be."

"I've read the reports, Steve. They beat you with a crowbar... You had so much head trauma you were having seizures..."

"What?"

"They didn't tell you?"

"No, I'm pretty sure I would remember if somebody had mentioned seizures..." Steve was beginning to get slightly worried_. If they didn't tell me that I was having seizures, what else did the doctors not tell me? _ He pressed the nurse call button. _Well, we'll just find out, won't we?"_

"Well, maybe they just didn't want to worry you. You did only wake up for the first time last night."

"So?"

Cath heard the bullheaded anger in that word, and strange as it might sound, it made her feel better. _Part of him being Smooth Dog is that underlying fierceness, that ability to grab onto something like a pit bull and not let go. And right now, he's going after answers, and he isn't going to stop until he gets them. And then, he's going to take someone to task for not telling him right off._

"Yes?" Catherine heard a young woman's voice through the phone. "Is something the matter, Commander?"

"You're not planning on terrifying some poor nurse, are you, Steve?"

"Of course not," Steve answered Cath's question before looking at the nurse with steel in his eyes. "I need to speak to the doctor, as soon as possible, please."

She nodded and shut the door.

"Oh, Steve."

"What?"

"Patience has never been your strong suit."

"I can be patient when I have to be."

Catherine sniffed.

"I just don't usually see any advantage in waiting for things."

"Now that's the Steve I know and love."

"Well, I guess it's a good thing I've got people like you who are willing to put up with me."

"And people like Danny and Chin and Kono who are willing to follow you around and watch your back."

"Yeah."

"How is Danny?"

"He sounds okay. I talked to him for a while this morning. Got a first-rate rant through the wall until the nurses came to chew us out."

"Through the wall?"

"Yeah, the first time, he knocked the phone on the floor. But after they told us off for shouting, they must have helped him get to the phone. I spent most of the morning talking to him on the phone until Chin came and told me that I needed to leave the line open so that you could get through."

"Remind me to buy that man flowers."

Steve chuckled. "Somehow, I doubt he'd go for that."

"You owe him and Kono big for saving your asses and taking care of you."

"I know. Maybe I'll give them a few weeks off, instead of making them work with HPD while Danno and I are stuck in here."

"Stuck in where?"

"Here, the hospital. Apparently, the governor feels that I can be too... 'careless with my health' were the words he used, I think. And that I must therefore be forced to stay here, as long as the doctors want to keep me, or he'll fire me."

"Those poor nurses," Catherine said sympathetically. "No one should be subjected to you for weeks. You're the worst patient on the face of the planet."

"So you'll campaign for my early release?"

"No... but I might buy some nurses flowers."

"I sure hope you didn't have Sarah drag me in here just so you could ask to go home, Commander. Because it's not happening. Not today, not tomorrow, not for several weeks." Min Fong stood in the doorway, hands on her hips.

"I understand that," Steve said to her. "I just wanted the doctor to explain why I wasn't told I'd had seizures. Why I had to hear it from someone halfway around the world."

"Concussive convulsions." Dr. Fong approached the bed. "While they visibly resemble gran mal seizures, they're somewhat different. In about 1% of concussions, convulsions occur within the first ten minutes. They are not indicative of brain damage, nor are they likely to recur. They are also not related to PTSD or post-traumatic epilepsy. In short, Commander, you weren't informed that you suffered them because they have no impact on your treatment or prognosis."

Steve nodded to the doctor even as he asked into the phone, "You get that, Cath?"

"Well, it's one less thing to worry about."

Steve refocused on the diminutive figure in front of him. "Was there anything else I wasn't told about my condition?"

"Without knowing exactly what you were told, I can't say for sure. However, knowing Ray, he only left out the convulsions because they were over and done with. I expect he most likely was trying to tell you all the important things in as concise a manner as possible. Would you like me to run through all of your injuries with you?"

"Yes." Steve's voice was adamant. "But give me a minute to say goodbye to my girlfriend first."

"I'll get your chart."

"I'm sorry, Cath, but I really need to find out what's going on."

"I understand."

"You want me to call you back when she's done talking?"

"Don't plan on it, Commander." Steve looked up at the doctor's firm tones. "The nurses tell me you've been awake and busy since six this morning, which means after our chat, you'll be taking a nap."

"But I've apparently been asleep for a week!"

"Correction: you've been comatose for most of the last six days. You still need to sleep."

"But I'm not tired!"

Dr. Fong examined the PCA, then hit the button herself. "You will be soon."

"Hey!"

"If you're going to refuse all analgesics, I'll have this replaced. I understand you like to be in control, Commander, but you are not on a mission, and there is no good reason why you should deny yourself the pain relief and rest your body needs to heal."

Catherine giggled down the phone line.

"And just what do you find so funny about this?"

"That you've met your match, and she's apparently dedicated to make sure you get well, even if you hate her for it."

"Well, since you have such a high opinion of me, maybe I'll just go back to talking to doctor."

Cath laughed again, and Steve was struck by how out-of-control she sounded. _Bordering on hysteria. She's only laughing to keep from crying. _"Jeez, Cath, I'm sorry. I've been kind of a jerk this morning, calling the nurse and the doctor while I was on the phone with you..."

"Yeah, well, you getting answers got me answers, so I'll forgive you that. But I'm still looking forward to eating out on your dime next time I'm there."

"Hope it's soon. Where are you?"

"Gulf of Aqaba."

"So I've got time to get better before I need to clean the house?"

"Please, your house is always clean."

"Probably not anymore. My sister's been there for a week."

"You forget, I've met Mary. I think clean is in both of your genes."

Dr. Fong cleared her throat and pointed to her watch.

"Gotta go for now, Cath. The doc's waiting to tell me how I am."

"Alright, Steve. But don't get into any more trouble for a while, okay? I'm not sure how much more of this worrying I can take."

"I'm sorry about worrying you."

"It comes with the territory. I know you. Your job will always be dangerous, whether you're a SEAL or a cop, and there's always the chance that you'll be hurt." She paused. "Goodbye, Steve. I'll talk to you later."

"Alright. Bye for now, Cath."

Steve hung up the phone. "So how am I, doc?"

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H

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The following day, both Danny and Steve were deemed fit enough to be transferred to regular inpatient rooms.

The fact that the nurses had stopped drawing straws to determine who would _**get**_ to be the one to give a sponge bath and started drawing them to see who would _**have**_ to tell them they couldn't visit each other had nothing to do with it.

**AN:**

Like it? Click the button and tell me how you really feel.

I can't wait to hear everyone tell me their "Love it!", "Hate it!", and "Why didn't you?" moments of reading this chapter/story.

Chapter 7 coming soon. Final revisions in progress.


	7. BOHICA

Well, here it is.

The last chapter.

Enjoy.

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_**BOHICA**_

_**Bend Over, Here It Comes Again**_

_(the ass references, that is, not the whump)_

Nurse Lindsey Wright was just making her evening rounds. It was commonplace. Boring, even. Read the charts, check the vitals, administer meds, make notations. Next patient. Read the charts, check the vitals, administer meds, make notations. Ad nauseum.

Then Lindsey opened the door to room 422 and walked in to see the patient (a Steven McGarrett, who'd been transferred from the ICU that afternoon) standing by the window.

"Oh, Mr. McGarrett," breathed the nurse as she checked out the view afforded by the hospital gown, "I know I'm supposed to tell you to get back into bed, but I have to admit I like the view." _Hot damn, even beat all to hell, he's __**HOT**__ with a capital H-O-T. And that tramp stamp? I would _**love **_to be able to trace that... _she pulled herself back to reality with a mental jerk. **No**___leering at the patients, _she told herself firmly.

"So do I," Steve replied, completely clueless that the nurse was _**not**_ talking about the view out the window. "There's something about watching the sun set on the waves that makes everything feel tranquil, no matter how crazy your life is."

Lindsey actually giggled. _That is _**so**_ not what I meant. And from the way he's standing, you'd never guess that he has so many broken bones. But he _**really**_ shouldn't be standing. Dangit! What could have possessed him to think that it would be okay to go traipsing around on a cracked femur? Not to mention with all his other injuries!_

"I'm glad you think so, and I'd have to agree, but you need to come back to bed right now, Mr. McGarrett, or I'll have to come over there and grab your ass and haul you back myself." _Oooh, and doesn't that just paint a pretty mental picture?_ She took another quick glance before he turned to face her. "Although from the bruising, it looks like someone may have already done that recently."

"I'll tell Danny you remarked on it." Steve smirked. _Or will I?_

"How's Danny doing, anyway?" he asked, knowing he wouldn't win an argument with the nurse at this point. _And I don't really have the energy for it, anyway._ Steve took the few steps back to the bed, the arm not bound to his chest using the IV pole like a walker.

"Danny?" Lindsey asked, watching the tough guy in front of her try to hide his pain, although she caught the wince as he skootched from the edge of the bed to the middle.

"Detective Williams. My partner. The back-up that gotten beaten up with me." He paused a moment, thinking. "I think Kono said he's right next door." Steve swatted her hand away and grabbed his injured thigh to pull it up himself, but let the redhead pull the blanket over his legs for him. _Why bend over if I don't have to? Besides, this way I get another nice view, too. Gotta love those V-neck scrub tops on a well-endowed woman._

"I'm assuming he's on track with his recovery since he was moved here from the ICU this afternoon, too; but I haven't checked on Mr. Williams yet."

"Well, when you check on him, will you tell him I got a better offer?" He winked at her. "He still _**claims**_ he was only trying to wake me up when he pinched my ass."

THE END.

For real, this time.

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_**And a great big**_

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_**to all of my reviewers!**_

This story would never have become more than a one-shot without you.

So, read like a wolf eats and write on!

I look forward to reading your works soon.

PS to **4tgoffive and TMVH50- **you wanted the boys in the same room, and while I strongly considered it for this final scene, I ended up coming to the conclusion that since the staff wants them to rest, they would not put them in the same room because they do play off each other so much. While it might be easier for the people visiting, it would not make it easier for the staff to control the two stubborn people who don't really want to be there. Since the docs have experience with our boys, I'm betting they know that putting them in the same room is asking for them to argue for hours and throw balls of paper at each other to get each others' attention, etc. Having them in separate rooms not only makes it easier to take them on one at a time rather than both at once, but it gives the doctors a reward or the ability to withhold something the boys want (ie, phone and visiting priveleges) to ensure compliance. And I did not put them in the same room in the last chapter because in all the hospitals I have been in, I have yet to see an ICU room with double occupancy. But thank you both very much for the reviews.


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